
Class _PS^X 
Boole jVw 3 

COHmiGHT DEPOSm 



/ 
A HISTORY OF 0^ 
AMERICAN LITERATURE 



BY 
WILLIAM B. CAIRNS, Ph.D. 

Assistant Professor of American Literature in the 
University of Wisconsin 



NEW YORK 
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 

AMERICAN BRANCH : 35 West 32nd Street 
LONDON, TORONTO, AND MELBOURNE. HENRY FROWDE 

1912 



f>'r 



y 



,o^ 



Copyright, 1912 
BY Oxford University Press 

AMERICAN BRANCH 



11 

SCI.A31G946 



0^^ jix M 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I 

PAGE 

The Colonial Time (1607-1765) 1-102 

I. The Southern Colonies 1 

II. The New England Colonies. First Period, 

1620-1676 21 

III. The New England Colonies. Second Period, 

1676-1765 56 

IV. The Middle Colonies , 90 

CHAPTER II 

The Revolutionary Period (1765-1800) . 103-157 

I. Controversial Writings 103 

II. General Literature 122 

CHAPTER III 

The Early Nineteenth Century (1800-1833) 158-219 

I. General Conditions; the Knickerbocker Writers 158 

II. Writers of New England 197 

III. Writers of Philadelphia; the South; the 

West 209 

IV. Orators; Scholars * 215 

iii 



iv CONTENTS 

CHAPTER IV 

PAGE 

The Central Period (1833-1883) 220-460 

I. General Conditions 220 

II. The New England Transcendentalists 222 

III. The New England Abolitionists 254 

IV. Miscellaneous New England Writers 284 

V. New York Writers 356 

VI. Pennsylvania Writers 395 

VII. Southern Writers 404 

VIII. Western Writers 436 

CHAPTER V 

Recent Years (1883-1912) 461-483 



PEEFACE 

This book attempts to trace within reasonable compass the 
course of literary development in America^ and to present 
the most significant facts regarding American authors and 
their works. It places greatest emphasis on general move- 
ments, because American literature is first of all important 
as an expression of national life. There are few American 
writings that require careful analysis and merit intensive 
study as masterpieces. But in a nation where education has 
from the first been so generally diffused^ literary attempts of 
slight artistic merit may reflect not only the obvious changes 
in national life and ideals^ but subtler tendencies and aspira- 
tions. For this reason attention is given not only to the 
few greater writers^ but to many others whose works, though 
less important in themselves, are sometimes even more sig- 
nificant. The plan of the book and the decision what to 
include and what to exclude have been influenced by the 
author^s experiences with college classes; but an attempt has 
been made to meet the wants of the general reader as well 
as those of the systematic student. 

In tracing tendencies and movements it has been necessary 
to adopt a geographical classification of authors; and this 
has sometimes been carried beyond the point where it is 
significant. It is a matter of the greatest importance whether 
an author represents the spirit of Puritan New England or 
the spirit of Cavalier Virginia; it is of little importance 
whether he chances to write in New Hampshire or in Ver- 
mont. For convenience, however, smaller as well as larger 
groupings have been made on the basis of residence. In 
adopting this plan the author wishes to disclaim any intention 
of over-emphasizing sectional differences. 

V 



vi Preface 

As a general rule the works of living authors have not been 
discussed in detail. Exception has been made in the case of 
two or three men whose reputations were achieved many 
years ago, and whose Jiterary work is evidently done. It 
would have been easier, and perhaps more satisfactory, to 
close this history with authors who flourished in the middle 
of the nineteenth century; but it seemed desirable to add 
some comment on literary conditions in recent years. Liv- 
ing writers are mentioned as illustrations of schools and 
tendencies, but no attempt is made to estimate their rank, 
or to name all who are worthy. Even after this explanation 
is given it would doubtless be hard to tell why some are 
included and others are omitted. The author expects no 
general assent to the judgments in the last chapter; but it 
is his consolation that the lapse of a few years makes all 
estimates of contemporary writings seem strange. He trusts 
that he may live to feel for himself that many things in this 
section of the book are thoroughly amusing. 

W. B. C. 

University of Wisconsin, 
April, 1913. 



A HISTORY OF AMERICAN LITERATURE 



Vll 



CHAPTEK I 

The Colonial Time (1607-1765) 

I. The Southern Colonies 

The literature of America was an off-shoot from that of 

England. If an exact date for the divergence must be given, 

it may be set at 1607, the year of the found- 

The Beginning jj^g ^f h^q fj^g^ permanent British colony in 

Literature ^^^^ ^^^ world. At this time Shakespeare 

was still writing, and, as will be seen, may 
have received a suggestion for one play from an American 
book. The very year of the Jamestown settlement saw the 
writing or publication of works by Beaumont and Fletcher, 
Chapman, Dekker, Marston, and others of the group who, 
though they wrote largely in the reign of James, are known 
as the later Elizabethans. These men did not, however, exert 
any strong direct influence on their contemporaries who 
emigrated to the 'New World. Most of them, it will be 
noted, are remembered for their writings in two depart- 
ments of pure literature — the drama and the lyric. The 
early settlers of Virginia wrote mostly in prose, and they 
wrote, not as men of letters, but as practical explorers, 
colonists, business men. They told the story of their adven- 
tures, and described the country to which they had come; 
and if they tried to make their narratives and descriptions 
attractive it was with a commercial rather than with an 
esthetic purpose. 

But though the connection between Elizabethan literature 
and these early writers was indirect, it was none the less 
important. The whole colonization of Virginia was in itself 
an expression of the spirit and temper of the Elizabethan 

1 



2 American Literature 

time. The love of adventure, the credulity with which men 
believed in the existence of wealth in every unexplored land, 

the intense wonder with which they viewed the 
Influence of the flora, the fauna, and the inhabitants of their 
Soirit "^^^ home, are shown on every page of the 

history of Jamestown. One does not need to 
read far in the narratives of almost any of these early Vir- 
ginian writers before he realizes that here is the same attitude 
of mind, the same philosophy of life, so often expressed on 
the Elizabethan stage. 

The earliest American writings were in prose, and English 
prose had not at this time attained its full development. The 

day of Euphuism had gone by, and the 
Influence of fashion was setting toward a saner and more 

vigorous style of writing; but few works had 
yet appeared which were associated with the evolution of 
modern prose style. The first book written in America was 
published three years before the King James version of the 
Bihle, four years before any of Bacon^s Essays took their 
final form, and a generation before the religious and polit- 
ical writings of Jeremy Taylor and Milton. English prose 
of this time had a fire and a melody of its own ; but even in 
the hands of men of letters it was likely to be unformed, 
sometimes ungrammatical, and always lacking in the terse- 
ness and finish of a later day. When attempted by untrained 
literary workers it might lose none of its force, but it was 
likely to become involved, sometimes even chaotic, in struc- 
ture. 

All these crude but vigorous qualities are found in the 
style of the first American writer — Captain John Smith 

(1580P-1631). It is more than a coincidence 
Captam ^j^^^ ^j^ name which stands first in a history 

John Smith . i i. i 

of American literature is that of a man who 

is known to every schoolboy for different achievements from 



The Colonial Time 3 

those of his pen. In the Elizabethan age men of letters were 
men of action. Conversely, many men known chiefly for 
their activities in politics, exploration, or war left writ- 
ings of value. Indeed, the peculiarities of Elizabethan prose 
style may be traced largely to the fact that prose was written 
by men like Sidney, Ealeigh, and others who possessed 
similar energy but slighter literary talent. It is impossible 
to judge what John Smith wrote without remembering 
what he did. 

The achievements of this man, if his own testimony is 

to be trusted, are among the most remarkable of modern 

times. According to his account he was born 

Captain Smith's ^^ WiUoughby on the flat coast of Lincoln- 
Achievements ^ *^ 

shire. While he was a mere boy his father 

died, and he was rather shabbily treated by his guardians, 

who finally apprenticed him to a merchant. The life to 

which his apprenticeship bound him was distasteful, and at' 

the age of fifteen he ran away and became a soldier of 

fortune. He fought in France and the low countries; 

journeyed to Scotland with letters to the king, but had 

little success as a courtier; went back to WiUoughby and 

lived for some months a hermit in the woods; returned to 

the continent, where he went through experiences too 

numerous to mention; was cast overboard from a vessel in 

the Mediterranean, and picked up by a pirate; took part in 

an engagement and received his share of the booty; and 

finally reached the East, the scene of his most marvellous 

adventures. Here he saw much of the war against the 

Turks, and in every movement, he tells us, he played a 

leading part. He was useful to his commander, both in 

suggesting plots and stratagems, and in actual conflict. One 

of his most dramatic accounts is that of his combat ^^to 

delight the ladies^^ with three Turks in succession, each of 

whom he slew and decapitated. Finally he was taken captive 



4: American Literature 

and sent as slave to a Turkish lady of rank. The relations 
of the two soon became highly romantic — Smith always 
made a good impression on the other sex. Unfortunately 
the lady had a cruel brother who treated him with indignity. 
Finally the Captain killed his tormentor, appropriated his 
clothes and his horse, and escaped, riding alone many days 
through the desert. These adventures, but 'the most impor- 
tant of which have been mentioned, were accomplished before 
the hero returned to England in 1605, aged about twenty- 
five years. 

For the next year and a half Smith seems to have done 
nothing noteworthy. Then he comes into view again as 
one of the most conspicuous of the men who founded the 
colony at Jamestown. Here he appears, from his own writ- 
ings and those of his contemporaries, as a bluff, quarrel- 
some, energetic man, afraid of no one, sometimes under 
arrest, once in danger of execution, but generally coming 
out victor, and showing himself perhaps the most sagacious, 
practical manager in the whole settlement. He directed the 
palisading of the fort, explored the rivers, and the surround- 
ing country, traded and treated with the Indians, and at 
the same time took his part in all the intestine broils that 

characterized the first months of the colony. 

Smith's First j^. ^^^ j^ ^ ^^^^ ^^ f^^^^^ ^^ ^-{j^ 
Book 

all his other labors, to write what so far 

as we know was his first book, and what was certainly 
the first English book written in a permanent American 
settlement — A True Relation of such occurrences and acci- 
denis of noate as hath hapned in Virginia since the first 
planting of that Collony, which is notu resideiit in the South 
part thereof, till the last returne from thence. 

This work, perhaps written with no thought of its publi- 
cation, contains a history of the first months of the settle- 
ment, with a description of the country and its inhabitants. 



The Colonial Time 5 

It is not a long work^ occupying but forty pages of rather 
coarse type in Mr. Arber^s reprint; though it is possible 
that the proprietors of the colony suppressed some of Smith's 
frank statements. Very likely its composition was begun 
in 1607^ soon after the expedition landed. The manuscript 
was taken to England in the early summer of 1608, and 
printed later in the same year. 

During the rest of his stay in Virginia Smith wrote but 
one other work of importance — A Map of Virginia, with a 
Description of the Countrey the Commod- 
^ith s Later {fies. People, Government and Religion. 
This contains little narrative, but is a descrip- 
tion of the country, its physical features, climate, plants, 
animals, and inhabitants. It was sent to England, probably 
late in the year 1608, but was not published until 1612, and 
then, somewhat strangely, at the University Press, Oxford. 
At the same time with the Map of Virginia Smith sent a 
letter to the London proprietors of the colony, answering 
sharply their demands for immediate financial returns. 

John Smith returned to England in 1609, and remained 
there till 1614, when he again sailed to America and made a 
map of the coast from Cape Cod to the Penobscot. In 1615 
he started for New England with a colony, but the expedi- 
tion met disaster at the hands of French pirates. After 
his escape from his captors and his return to England he 
devoted himself to writing, producing a considerable number 
of works. Among those which have reference to America 
are: A Description of New England, 1616; New Englands 
Trials, 1620, 1622; The General Historic of Virginia, 1624; 
Advertisements for the Unexperienced Planters of New 
England, or Anyivhere, 1631. His autobiography. The True 
Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captaine John 
Smith, was written about a year before his death, which 
occurred in 1631. 



6 American Literature 

The only authority for the early adventures of Captain 
Smith is this autobiography. His statements regarding his 
exploits are therefore hard to prove or dis- 
prove; but it is safe to say that, though they 
evidently have some basis in fact, many of the details over- 
tax credulity. When we come to his experiences in Virginia 
there are other accounts that may be compared vi^ith his 
own. These all show that, whether he was a braggart or 
not, he was probably the one man among the helpless 
adventurers at Jamestown who was really equal to the occa- 
sion. But even in the American narrative it is obvious that 
he delights in the use of the pronoun "I,^^ the monotony 
of which he varies by frequent references to ^Taptain 
Smith^^; and there is strong reason for believing that some 
of the experiences that he relates have little or no basis in 
fact. The one which has aroused most discussion is the story 
of his rescue by Pocahontas. In the True Relation, written 
soon after he was captured and taken to Powhatan, he speaks 
of that monarch as most friendly, and in another connection 
refers to Pocahontas as a mere child. The first reference to 
the rescue was made in a letter which Smith wrote to Queen 
Anne in 1616, when he was living in obscurity, while the 
^^Indian Princess,^^ now married to John Eolfe, was attract- 
ing much attention in London. It is possible that the 
account of Powhatan^s hostility was omitted from the Trtie 
Relation in order not to frighten immigrants; but it is 
much more likely that the story was coined to connect the 
heroes name with that of a social celebrity. 

Except for the fact that John Smith was the first Amer- 
ican writer, his place in the world of letters is unimportant. 
It must be remembered, however, that few 
SJus^ ^'*^^^^y of his English contemporaries who confined 
themselves to prose won high literary rank. 
Even as prose, his writings are by no means devoid of merit. 



The Colonial Time 7 

In his later work^ written when he had more leisure, and 
looked on life in a calmer way, there are sentences that 
possess the true Elizabethan melody : 

Who can desire more content, that hath small meanes ; or but only 
his merit to advance his fortune, then to tread, and plant that 
ground hee hath purchased by the hazard of his life? If he have but 
the taste of virtue and magnanimitie, what to such a minde can bee 
more pleasant, then planting and building a foundation for his Pos- 
teritie, gotte from the rude earth, by God's blessing and his owne 
Industrie, without prejudice to any? If hee have any graine of faith 
or zeale in Religion, what can hee doe lesse hurtfull to any : or more 
agreeable to God then to seeke to convert those poore Salvages to 
know Christ, and humanitie, whose labors with discretion will tripple 
requite thy charge and paines? What so truely sutes with honour 
and honestie, as the discovering things unknowne? erecting Townes, 
peopling Countries, informing the ignorant, reforming things unjust, 
teaching virtue ; and gaine to our Native mother-countrie a kingdom 
to attend her : finde imployment for those that are idle, because they 
know not what to doe : so farre from wronging any, as to cause 
Posteritie to remember thee ; and remembering thee, ever honour that 
remembrance with praise? 

In the works produced in America such passages as this are 
hardly to be found. The circumstances that repressed lit- 
erary activity in the colonies, and that in some measure 
have crippled American literature almost to the present, 
began to make themselves felt at once. The True Relation 
and the Map of Virginia must have been written hastily, 
at odd moments, in the midst of fatiguing physical toil and 
mental anxiety. Both are, for the most part, plain blunt 
narratives and descriptions of what the author had himself 
seen. There was not time even for such obvious general- 
izations as are found in the paragraph quoted above. In 
the True Relation, especially, narrative clauses often crowd 
each other, as in the following : 

The two and twenty day of Aprill, Captain Newport and myselfe 
with divers others, to the number of twenty two persons, set forward 
to discover the River, some fiftie or sixtie miles, finding it in some 
places broader, and in some narrower, the Countrie (for the moste 



8 American Literature 

part) on each side plaine high ground, with many fresh Springes, the 
people in all places kindly intreating us, daunsing and feasting us 
with strawberries. Mulberries, Bread, Fish, and other their Countrie 
provisions whereof we had plenty : for which Captaine Newport 
kindely requited their least favours with Bels, Pinnes, Needles, 
beades, or Glasses, which so contented them that his liberallitie made 
them follow us from place to place, and ever kindely to respect us. 

Prose like this violates most rhetorical conventionalities, but 

it is perfectly clear. Smith is an example of the nnlearned 

pioneer and adventurer who writes because he has something 

to say, and whose straightforwardness saves him from 

ambiguity. 

William Strachey was a colonist of a different sort. 

Though little is known of his life he was evidently a man 

of some prominence and experience in polit- 

ei^ ^f°^ ical affairs, who in 1610 came to Virginia 

Strachey . . ^ ^ 

with Sir Thomas Gates, was secretary of the 
colony for about three years, and afterward returned to 
England. On the journey over Sir Thomas Gates^s fleet 
was scattered in a storm, and his own ship, on which 
Strachey was a passenger, was wrecked on the Bermudas. 
From these islands the survivors escaped in rude vessels 
of their own construction, and reached Jamestow^n nearly 
a year after they first set out. Strachey^s chief work written 
in America is an account of the hardships of this voyage, 
entitled A true Reportory of the Wracke, and Redemption 
of /?iV Thomas Gates Knight; upon and from the Hands of 
the Bermudas: his Com.ming to Virginia, and the Estate of 
that Colonie then, and after, under the Government of the 
Lord La Warre, This pamphlet was written in 1610, and 
printed in London before the close of the same year. It 
has for us an intrinsic interest as one of the strongest speci- 
mens of prose to be found among Southern colonial writings; 
and perhaps even greater interest from the fact that some 
Shakespearean scholars believe it to have furnished sug- 



The Colonial Time 9 

gestions for "The Tempest/^ The claim can hardly be 
proved or disproved; but even a casual reader will notice 
correspondences between parts of the narrative and scenes of 
the play.* 

Strachey was a man of some education and culture, though 
probably not a trained writer. His Wmcke and Redemp- 
tion shows a conscious striving after effect such as might 
be expected of a man of literary inexperience who was trying 
to narrate a terrible occurrence. His Historie of Travaile 
into Virginia Brittania, partly written and partly compiled 
after his return to England, is plodding and uninspired. 

A later official of the colony was George Sandys (1577- 
1644), who held the position of treasurer from 1621 to 
1624 or 1625. At the time of his appoint- 
eorge a y jj^^^^ }^q ^^s engaged on a translation of 
Ovid^s Metamorphoses, and had already completed five books. 
After his arrival in Virginia he translated the remaining ten 
books, and the whole was published in 1626, after his return 
to England. It is one of the more notable of that group of 
translations of which Chapman^s Homer is perhaps the best 
known example, and for many years was given high rank 
by critics and scholars. In the dedication of the completed 
volume, addressed to King Charles, the author says: 

It needeth more than a single denization, being a double stranger ; 
sprung from the stock of the ancient Romanes, but bred in the new 
world, of the rudeness whereof it cannot but participate, especially 
having wars and tumults to bring it to light instead of the Muses. 

Very likely the work did suffer from the circumstances in 
which it was written; but it would puzzle a student to find 
any particular in which the translation is indebted to 
America, or to distinguish in manner between the ten books 
done here and the five completed in England. The connec- 

♦ A fair and concise statement of the evidence on this question is given in the 
Variorum edition of the play, edited by Dr. Horace Howard Furness. 



10 American Literature 

tion of Sandys with Virginia should be remembered chiefly 
as a reminder that official appointment sometimes brought to 
the New World men of high scholarship and real literary gift. 
Smith, Strachey, and Sandys typify three important 
classes of early writers — the unlettered adventurer who wrote 

with little thought of form, the gentleman in 
T ree Types o public life who attempted a literary record 

of his experiences, and the scholar whose 
work continued the same here as in England. The first two 
of these classes contained many representatives. In an age 
when everything connected with America excited so much 
interest and wonder, every emigrant who could guide a pen 
was likely to attempt, for private friends at least, some 
account of what he saw. So great was the demand for news 
from America that many of these private letters, as well as 
writings intended for publication, found their way into print. 
Some of these are only less notable — indeed some may be 
even more readable — than those of Smith and Strachey; but 
most of them do not merit consideration in a literary history. 
Mention should be made, however, of Alexander Whitaker 
(1585-1613?), "The Apostle of Virginia.'' Whitaker was a 

clergyman, a Cambridge graduate, who in 
ar y Minor IQH resigned his living in the north of 

England to come as a missionary to the 
Indians, and who labored faithfully at various places in the 
colony until his death some five or six years later. His Good 
News from Virginia, which appeared in London in 1613, 
contains some description of the country, but treats espe- 
cially of the natives and their moral and spiritual condition. 
Its object was to convince the English people that the Indian 
was not merely a curious animal, but a rational human 
being, for whom as a fellow-man they were responsible. 
John Pory (1570?-1635?), another Cambridge man, was a 
more amusing if a less edifying writer. He came to America 



The Colonial Time 11 

under different circumstances, being presumably sent by his 
family because his drunkenness made him inconvenient at 
home. In his earlier years, about 1600, he was engaged in 
historical studies and in preparing translations of works of 
travel under the direction of Eichard Hakluyt. In America 
his indolence and his bad habits kept him from writing 
much, but he left an account of three excursions among the 
Indians, reprinted by Smith in his General Historie, and 
a gossipy letter to Sir Dudley Carleton. As an observer 
he seems to have had a way of looking on the odd and amus- 
ing side of things, and though he could not be classed as a 
humorist there is a touch of facetiousness about all his work. 
The writings produced during the first twenty years of 
the Jamestown colony, though meagre, were more than could 
be expected from men in such circumstances; and a con- 
temporary would have seemed justified in predicting that, 
with more leisure and fewer hardships, a distinctive Ameri- 
can literature would arise in that part of the continent to 
which they belonged. Such a prediction, if made, was never 
fulfilled. After the first half-generation of 

a er i erary settlement there was no continuous develop- 
Development ^ 

ment of literature m the South. The few 

works that did appear for the next one hundred and forty 

years were sporadic and unrelated. The reasons for this 

literary poverty were of two classes — those depending on the 

character of the colonists and those depending on their 

environment. 

The early immigrants to the Southern colonies differed 

widely in morals and in social position, but they agreed in 

one respect: with few exceptions they came 
Characteristics ^q i\^q ]yfe^ World for the sole purpose of 
Colonists bettering themselves in a material way. They 

were not, like the pioneers in Massachusetts, 
devotees to a principle, but adventurers, some in a good and 



12 American Literature 

some in a bad sense of that term. Most of them came with 
the idea of returning to England as soon as they had 
acquired a competence; and those who stayed considered 
themselves^ at least for a generation or two^ not primarily 
Virginians or South Carolinians^ but Englishmen sojourn- 
ing in the wilderness. Such men did not feel called upon to 
produce much in the way of literature. The drama, the 
lyric, and lighter forms of writing that are associated with 
a life of polite leisure could not be expected during the 
period of hardship. The adventures of the early colonists, 
romantic as they seem to us, were such stern realities for all 
concerned that no one had time to be a laureate. Perhaps, 
too, the romantic element, as in the case of the Pocohontas 
story, has been mostly added by the imagination of later 
narrators. Love and war, it is sometimes said, are the great 
stimuli to literature. War there was, of a sort, but the 
Indian conflicts were not of a nature to call forth an Iliad; 
and love was not likely to inspire a poet while the planters' 
wives were imported girls secured from the ship-masters on 
payment of their passage-money. 

There was not even an incentive to the more matter-of-fact 

kinds of writing. The Pilgrim felt, from the first day of 

his outward voyage, that he was founding a Commonwealth, 

• and that upon him devolved the duty of writing its history 

for posterity. The Virginian felt no such duty to his new 

and probably temporary home. In politics the Virginian 

was usually a Eoyalist, and in religion an Episcopalian. In 

both he occupied traditional, conservative ground, which to 

his mind needed no defense or apology unless attacked. 

/ There was no temptation, therefore, to publish controversial 

' pamphlets and sermons. All that the early settler could 

be expected to do was to write narratives of his adventures, 

and descriptions of the country, and this is what he did. 

. By the time that the colonies became established, and men 



The Colonial Time 13 

were proud to consider themselves Virginians, the causes of 

the second class, those arising from the circumstances of life, 

repressed literary activity. Chief among these 

Ts^h^^^I/f ^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ ^^ education. The plantation 
system, which was made possible in Vir- 
ginia by the great number of navigable rivers, tended to 
the isolation of each family. Neighbors lived so far apart 
that common schools would have been impossible, even 
if the government had wished to establish them. Small 
children could be educated only by private tutors, and these 
were expensive and hard to secure. Under these conditions 
the Southerners came to consider education unnecessary, and 
acquiesced in the plans of the royal governors, who discour- 
aged it as a menace to their power. As a result, the state 
of learning, even in families of wealth and real refinement, 
was almost incredibly low. William and Mary, long the 
only public educational institution in the South, was digni- 
fied by the name of a college, but really devoted itself mostly 
to instruction in elementary branches. A few sons of 
wealthy families were sent to English universities, where, 
if tradition is true, they learned chiefly the dissipations and 
accomplishments of an English gentleman. Many members 
of even well-to-do families could hardly read or write. 
... The repressive policy of the government extended not only 
to schools but to the printing press. There was virtually no 
printing in Virginia for over a hundred years, and but one 
printing house until ten years before the Eevolution. South- 
ern writings, if published at all, were sent to London. 

One other tendency must be noticed, which in its opera- 
tion both repressed the production of writings in the South 
and restricted the circulation of those that were produced. 
Following a notion current to some extent in England dur- 
ing the eighteenth century, the Southern gentleman felt that 
literature was not exactly a reputable profession. It was 



14 American Literature 

proper for him to write, to circulate manuscript copies of his 
writings among his friends, and to have them neatly en- 
grossed on parchment and so transmitted to 
Southern Atti- ^ig children ; but it was not quite dignified 
Literature^ to have them printed, certainly not to print 

them for gain. At the same time the 
lack of facilities for printing in the colonies discouraged 
less punctilious authors, who might be financially unable 
to publish abroad. It may be conjectured that many works 
were written which, remaining in manuscript, have been 
lost in the ravages of three wars, or by the destructive acci- 
dents of two hundred years. True, this private and amateur 
authorship has not, in recent times, led to the best literary 
results. It is not probable that any great American epics 
or tragedies were lost to the world through the modesty of 
their authors; but it is very likely that works remained 
unpublished that were quite as important as some that are 
mentioned in this history. 

The dependence on England for education and for pub- 
lishing facilities, together with the general attitude of 
Southerners toward the mother country. 
Southern "^rit- accounts for the most notable characteristic 
English Models ^^ Southern colonial literature — namely, its 
connection with English rather than with 
American models. There was no ^^school^^ of Virginian 
writers. It can hardly be said that any Virginian book influ- 
enced any other Virginian book. At any given time, how- 
ever, the writings of Virginia gentlemen were certain to 
show the influence of contemporary or recent literary 
fashions in England. 

This characteristic is seen in the Burwell Papers, This 
name has been given to an anonymous manuscript which 
was found in the possession of the Burwell family in Virginia, 
and which deals with the civil disturbance of 1676, known as 



The Colonial Time 15 

Bacon's rebellion. Prom internal evidence it appears to have 
been written by an adherent, though not a strong partisan, 

of the royal governor, at a period not far 
Bturwell subsequent to the events of which it treats. 

The most noticeable peculiarity of the style 
is the excessive use of conceits, puns, artificial balances, 
and all the other mannerisms found in the Restoration prose 
at its worst. The following passage, stating the assumption 
of leadership by Ingram after Bacon's death, illustrates the 
intolerable prolixity of the author:' 

The Lion had no sooner made his exitt, but the Ape (by indubi- 
table right) steps upon the stage. Bacon was no sooner removed by 
the hand of good providence, but another steps in, by the wheele 
of fickle fortune. The Countrey had, for som time, bin guided by 
a company of knaves, now it was to try how it would behave it selfe 
under a foole. Bacon had not long bin dead, (though it was a long 
time before som would beleive that he was dead) but one Ingram 
(or Isgrum, which you will) takes up Bacons Commission (or ells 
by the patterne of that cuts him out a new one) and as though 
he had bin his natureall heire, or that Bacons Commission had bin 
granted not onely to him selfe, but to his Executors, Administraters, 
and Assignes, he (in the Millitary Court) takes out a Probit of 
Bacons will, and proclames him selfe his Successer. 

In the latter part of the manuscript are two poems on the 
death of Bacon, in rhymed pentameter verse, which likewise 
show the author's devotion to contemporary English models. 
Among the literary curiosities dating from a slightly later 
time is a little booklet now much sought by collectors, pub- 
lished in London in 1708, and bearing the 
Facto?*^"^^'''^ title The Sot-Weed Factor, or a Voyage into 
Maryland, A Satyr. By Eben. Cooh, Gent, 
Sot-Weed will be recognized as an uncomplimentary name 
for tobacco. A factor was a merchant or, more accurately, 
an agent who handled wares for a principal at home. It is 
not known who Ebenezer Cook was, or whether this was his 
real name; but in the poem he represents himself as such a 



16 American Literature 

factor, who had come to Maryland to barter for the chief 
product of the plantations. On first landing he notices the 
hospitality of the planters, even then proverbial; but the 
entertainment furnished is not much to his liking. After 
leaving the host who first entertains him the factor sets off 
on his business, and in the narrative of his adventures satir- 
izes the law courts, the inns, and all classes of the inhabi- 
tants, especially the Quakers. One of these he describes in 
lines perhaps the most frequently quoted of any in the poem : 

While riding near a Sandy Bay, 

I met a Quaker, Yea and Nay; 

A Pious Conscientious Rogue, 

As e*er woar Bonnet or a Brogue, 

Who neither Swore nor kept his Word, 

But cheated in the Fear of God ; 

And when his Debts he would not pay. 

By Light within he ran away. 

By trusting this Friend the factor is defrauded of all his 
goods. His efforts to recover them give occasion for further 
comments on the provincial courts and lawyers; and the 
victim, now penniless, returns home, leaving a curse on the 
whole country. In the absence of any knowledge regarding 
the author it is impossible to say what was the occasion of 
the poem, or how far the satire was inspired by malice. It 
gives the impression of being a shrewd caricature of some 
of the prevailing evils of the time. In form it shows evi- 
dent influence of Hudihras, which by 1700 was the model 
for burlesque satire; but it lacks the forced rhymes and the 
clever turns of phrase which characterize Butler's master- 
piece. 

At a later date there appeared in Maryland other poems 
which have been ascribed to Ebenezer Cook. The most not- 
able of these was a political satire, which was published at* 
Annapolis in 1730, and which bore the title Sotweed Redi- 
vivus: or the Planters Looking-Glass. In Burlesque Verse. 



The Colonial Time 17 

Calculated for the Meridian of Maryland. By E. C. Gent. 
It is probable^ however^ that this is the work of some other 
satirist, who sought to attract attention by adopting the 
metrical form of a popular poem and the initials of its 
author. Indeed, it is by no means certain that Ebenezer 
Cook was really a resident of Maryland, though the vivid- 
ness of his descriptions shows that he must have visited the 
colony. 

The most important Southern writer of the early eigh- 
teenth century was William Byrd (1674-1744). Of the 
authors who have thus far been mentioned 
Byrd was the first who was a native of Amer- 
ica. He was the son of a prominent and wealthy Virginian 
family. He was sent to England and the Continent for his 
education, studied law at the Middle Temple, was called to 
the bar, and was honored with membership in the Eoyal 
Society. After his return to America he lived on the family 
estate at Westover. Here, besides managing his extensive 
private interests he served the public in various capacities. 
He was a member of the commission which in 1728 estab- 
lished the boundary line between Virginia and North Caro- 
lina, and an account of his experiences during this survey is 
the most valuable of his writings. These writings were not 
intended for publication, but were handed down to the 
author^s descendants in a manuscript volume carefully 
engrossed and bound under his direction. This collection, 
sometimes known as the Westover Manuscripts^ contains, 
besides "The History of the Dividing Line,^^ "A Journey to 
the Land of Eden,'' "A Progress to the Mines,'' and "An 
Essay on Bulk Tobacco." The last-named essay may not be 
Byrd's own work. The papers were not printed until 1841. 

Colonel Byrd seems to have been regarded, both in his 
own and in succeeding generations, as an example of the 
highest type of Southern gentleman. He was a man of 



18 American Literature 

culture and social charm. He collected a private library, said 
to have been the largest in Virginia, and his writings show 
that he had an appreciation of literature, and a fondness for 
gaining — and sometimes for displaying. — odd bits of curious 
information. On his travels through the colonies he was 
a close observer, and he showed the catholic interest of an 
eighteenth century gentleman in matters of economic, his- 
torical, and scientific importance. ^^The History of the 
Dividing Line^^ gives much valuable information regarding 
the country, and the plants, animals, and natural curiosities, 
but it is most interesting for the shrewd comments on men 
and their ways, and for the revelation that it gives of the 
author's own character. 

Byrd's style is that of a man who had read and enjoyed 
the work of Addison and his contemporaries. While the 
New England writers were still adhering to the crabbed and 
pedantic manner of an earlier century, Byrd succeeded in 
writing prose that, though not remarkable for grace, had 
something of urbane charm. He occasionally indulged in 
the coarse jests that an eighteenth century Englishman 
seemed to think necessary, but in many other passages he 
showed a fine and genuine humor. All in all, his writings, 
though they have sometimes been absurdly over-praised, are 
among the most pleasantly readable of the colonial time. 

Besides the representative writings already mentioned, 
the later seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries saw 
the production of a considerable number of 
wSrs^^^^'^ other works written by Virginians and chiefly 
about Virginia. Perhaps the most readable 
of the early narratives is A Voyage to Virginia, by Colonel 
Norwood. Little is known of the author except that he was 
one of the disheartened royalists who fled to America in 
1649 after the execution of the king. On the way his party 
endured almost incredible privations on sea and land, being 



The Colonial Time 19 

forced at last to eat the bodies of their comrades who died 
of starvation. The story is a valuable one for its illustration 
of the hardships through which early colonists passed. It 
is also interesting for the picture which the author uncon- 
sciously gives of himself. A partisan of Cromwell would 
enjoy this revelation of one royalist, with his thoughts, even 
among the most appalling dangers, all fixed on the good things 
of this world-^with his appreciation of the physical charms 
of women, his love of good things to eat, and his shameless 
selfishness in gratifying his own appetite when his compan- 
ions were dying of starvation about him. In 1724 the Kever- 
end Hugh Jones (1669-1760), a professor in William and 
Mary college, published The Present State of Virginia. Pro- 
fessor Joneses literary method may be inferred from the fact 
that he entitled one chapter ^"^Of the Habits, Customs, Parts, 
Employments, Trade of the Virginians; and of the Weather, 
Coin, Sickness, Liquors, Servants, Poor, Pitch, Tar, Oar, 
&c.^^ He succeeded, however, in giving much valuable 
information, intermixed with many naive comments. By the 
beginning of the eighteenth century some thoughtful Vir- 
ginians began to turn attention to the history of their colony. 
Eobert Beverley (1675F-1716?) received his inspiration to 
historical study while completing his education in England, 
and brought out a history of Virginia in 1705. An enlarged 
version appeared in 1723. Like most histories of this time, 
the book contains a variety of geographical and miscellaneous 
information. Probably the most interesting section of the 
history is Part II, which treats of "The natural Produc- 
tions and Conveniences of the Country, suited to Trade and 
Improvement.^^ Beverley was a keen observer, with almost 
a poef s fondness for nature, combined with some of the 
explorer^s love of the venturesome and the marvellous. In 
1747 William Stith (1689-1755) published at Williams- 
burg The History of the First Discovery and Settlement of 



20 American Literature 

Virginia, covering the first sixteen years of the Jamestown 
settlement. For facts, he depends largely on John Smithes 
General Historie. His style is less attractive than that of 
Beverley. Mention must also be made of James Blair (1656- 
1743), the founder and first president of William and Mary 
college. He was graduated at the University of Edinburgh 
and came to Virginia in 1685. His published writings, the 
chief of which is a series of one hundred and seventeen ser- 
mons on the Sermon on the Mount, are unimportant, but he 
was probably the greatest intellectual force in early Virginia. 
Published writings in the Southern colonies other than 
Virginia and Maryland were few. They consisted mostly 

of descriptions of the country, written to 
0th cT • attract emigrants, pamphlets inspired by 

local or intercolonial disputes, and occasional 
sermons. Professor Moses Coit Tyler, after an exhaustive 
study, chose as representative of this extra- Virginian liter- 
ature John Lawson of North Carolina, Alexander Garden of 
South Carolina, and Patrick Tailfer of Georgia. Lawson 
(P-1712) came to America in 1700 and was surveyor- 
general of North Carolina. His writings are descriptions of 
his travels and explorations, given with more spirit than 
characterizes most such narratives. Alexander Garden 
(1685?-1756), who must not be confounded with two other 
South Carolinians of the same name, was an Episcopalian 
clergyman in Charleston about the middle of the eighteenth 
century. His literary work consisted of published sermons 
and letters directed against George Whitefield, the evangelist. 
Patrick Tailfer seems to have been the most prominent of 
a group of men who had quarrelled with the government of 
Georgia, and having left the colony, probably under com- 
pulsion, devoted themselves to publishing attacks upon Ogle- 
thorpe. They managed their case with considerable shrewd- 
ness and occasionally handled satire with effect. 



The Colonial Time 21 

II. The New England Colonies. First Period, 
1630-1676 

In the earliest writings of the New England colonies are 
to be found the real beginnings of American letters. In a 

search for the origin of what is best, and espe- 
The Real Begin- cially of what is weakest in our national 
icTn Literature' literature, the student of tendencies is led 

back at last to the crude writings of Ply- 
mouth and Massachusetts Bay. Strong as have been the 
influences of English and at times of Continental writers, 
it is easy to trace a continuous development from these 
pioneers in authorship to the New England of to-day. 

That this is true will be no surprise to the reader who 
recalls the outlines of New England history. The men who 

founded the two colonies now within the 
Ch^acteristics limits of Massachusetts came to the New 
Colonists World not primarily for gain, but in support 

of a principle. We shall err if in accepting 
this fact we allow our fancy to idealize these pioneers 
too much. Among even the earliest there were undoubt- 
edly men who had an eye to the advantages that might 
be gained by exploiting the wilderness; and human nature 
is such that even the most rapt and devout divine may 
be a very practical hand at a bargain, and a very shrewd 
politician. But with all their inconsistencies the Pilgrims 
and the Puritans were men who had very serious and on 
the whole very high ideals of life and of the part that God 
destined them to play in it. Especially was this true of the 
leaders of thought, the men who were most likely to write. 
Judging simply from the character of these men, we expect, 
what we find, a considerable body of serious and well-con- 
sidered writings. 
It was natural that men like the founders of New England 



22 American Literature 

should do all that was possible to encourage education. 

From the first grammar schools were required by law in every 

community; Harvard college was founded in 

New^En'^kn'd ^^^^' ^^^ *^^ ^^^^^ influence of church and 
state was exerted to secure the diffusion of 
learning. The result was^ first, a body of readers almost 
co-extensive with the population; and, second, a number of 
specially trained young men from whom the ranks of 
authorship were recruited. 

Side by side with the influence of educational institutions 
worked that of the printing press. A press was set up in 
Cambridge as early as 1639. Others followed soon after. 
And, though they were hampered by a strict church censor- 
ship, they put forth great quantities of such literature as 
was allowed. 

Both political and economic conditions made N"ew Eng- 
land largely dependent on herself for such writings as she 
wanted. To the Puritan, the great body of 

^^ oi- ^j. ^" the glorious literary work of the Elizabethan 
ence Slight ^ ^ 

age was forbidden by the discipline of his 
church. His own party, prolific as it was in controver- 
sialists, produced few literary men of preeminent distin(i- 
tion. The sermons and pamphlets written in New Eng- 
land were not notably inferior to those of Old England, 
and often were better adapted to local needs. Moreover, the 
influx of immigrants from the mother country was mostly 
confined to one decade, from 1630 to 1640. With the tri- 
umph of the Puritan party in England the necessity of emi- 
gration ceased. After the later date it has been estimated 
that the immigrants to New England were fewer in number 
than the persons who returned to the mother country. The 
result was that the colonies became isolated. Their wants 
were few, and from the first they had encouraged arts and 
manufactures. They imported little. In every way the 



The Colonial Time 23 

citizen of Massachusetts was far more remote from England 
than the Virginian, who annually loaded a ship with tobacco 
at his own wharf, and received from the same ship at its 
return even the simplest articles of household use. 

In no department of life was this isolation more complete 
or fraught with more serious results than in that of letters. 
To the time of the Eevolution the influence of English on 
New England literature was slight, indirect, and exerted by 
authors of inferior merit. It is not known that a copy of 
Shakespeare was brought to N"ew England until 1709, and 
none was offered for sale until 1722. Even Milton seems to 
have been ignored by the Puritans in America. There is no 
record of a copy of his works in New England before 1700, 
and no edition was printed in that section of the country 
until 1796. Standing thus aloof from all that was best in 
the literature that could do them the greatest good or harm, 
Americans carried on for a hundred and fifty years the tradi- 
tions that they brought with them. Students of language 
know that New England pronunciations, odd forms, and 
many so-called "Americanisms^^ are really survivals of 
English usage at the time of James the First. It is little 
more difficult to trace some of the peculiarities of our liter- 
ature back to the Puritan pamphleteers. The broader genial 
influence of the Elizabethans died out in Virginia; the 
narrow but intense spirit of the controversialists lived in 
New England, and after all the cosmopolitanism of the last 
hundred years may be seen in American literature to-day. 

At first glance it may seem strange that two colonies, both 
founded by Englishmen within the same quarter of a cen- 
tury, should differ so widely in literary ideals 
lish^nfluen ^^" ^^ ^^^ Virginia and Massachusetts. The ex- 
planation of this difference can be found 
both in the changed conditions in England and in the differ- 
ences between the men who emigrated to the North and to the 



24 American Literature 

South. The years just following 1607 were one of those 
transition periods in English literature when the writers of 
one generation pass away and the nation seems waiting for 
their successors. In the thirteen years between the found- 
ing of Jamestown and the founding of Plymouth there died 
Shakespeare^ Beaumont, Ealeigh, Sackville, Daniel, and 
Hakluyt ; in the next decade, before the founding of Massa- 
chusetts Bay, these were followed by Bacon, Giles and John 
Fletcher, Lodge, Middleton, and Purchas. Of the few writers 
who remained, like Jonson, Drayton, and Donne, most had 
done their best work. In the same period were born Milton, 
Samuel Butler, Jeremy Taylor, Baxter, Bunyan, Evelyn, 
Marvell, Suckling, Lovelace, Cowley, and Vaughan — the 
majority of the men who are remembered in the literary 
history of the seventeenth century. Between the later writ- 
ings of the first group and the earlier writings of the second 
there was a gap, a period when English literature was least 
fitted to exert helpful influence on colonial writings. 

Nor were the Puritans likely to be much affected by even 
the best work that continued the Elizabethan tradition. In 
their revolt against corruption they protested against the 
forms of literature in which this corruption was sometimes 
expressed. Their thoughts were on matters of religion; and 
partly because of their influence it was mainly theological 
writings that filled the literary interregnum of the early 
seventeenth century. In the reign of James I, more than 
in any other period of English history, religion was fashion- 
able. The king himself, his courtiers, and writers of all 
lesser degrees of rank discussed sacred subjects, and when 
they treated secular subjects, made use of a cant, a phrase- 
ology and imagery borrowed from the Bible and from sacred 
things. The numerous dissertations that show these char- 
acteristics are now devoid of interest except to the special 
student; none of them has held a place in literature. But 



The Colonial Time 25 

they were the models for the first writings produced in New 
England. 

The first literary impulse of any people emigrating to a 
new land is to write the story of their experiences, and the 
description of the country that they find. In 
The Historical ^-^q case of the Virginians this impulse ex- 
pressed itself in brief and hastily written 
accounts sent back to England for immediate publication. 
In New England its most important manifestation took a 
different form. To the mind of the Puritan the fact that he 
was a servant of God, founding a nation for God, in the 
wilderness, gave an importance to his every act. He realized, 
therefore, that a record of these acts would be valuable to 
posterity; and accordingly he wrote, not for the London 
public of the hour, but for the reader of that future when 
his deeds would be appreciated. In thus turning his atten- 
tion to history he carried out one of the few tendencies of 
the later Elizabethan time with which he could sympathize. 
The first quarter of the seventeenth . century was especially 
prolific in historical writings, of which Raleigh^s History 
of the World, DanieFs Wars of the Roses, and Bacon^s His- 
tory of Henry VII, are among those best remembered. As 
the authors of these works were many of them high in the 
affairs of the nation, so the first historians of Plymouth 
and Massachusetts Bay were governors of their respective 
colonies. 

William Bradford (1588-1657), the second governor of 
Plymouth, though but thirty-two years old when he landed 
from the Mayfiower, had been with the Pil- 
Bradf "d grims throughout their experiences in Holland, 

and had taken an active part in the delibera- 
tions that resulted in their coming to America. His 
first writing in the new world was done in collaboration with 
Edward Winslow, with whom he kept a journal of the first 



26 American Literature 

thirteen months of the colony. This was sent to England 
immediately upon its completion, and was published in 
London in 1622. As it was issued without the authors^ 
names and bore a prefatory note signed "G. Mourt^^ it came 
to be known as Mourt's Relation, and is still sometimes 
referred to by that title. Bradford's most important work, 
however, was the History of Plymouth Plantation, begun in 
1630, and continued for nearly twenty years. The first book 
of the history treats of the rise of the dissenters, the perse- 
cutions that induced them to flee to Holland, their expe- 
riences there, their reasons for desiring to come to America, 
and finally of the voyage of the Mayflower. The remainder 
of the work covers the period from 1620 to 1646 inclusive, 
and is in the form of annals. 

That the History of Plymouth was written for posterity 
is shown by the author's disposition of the manuscript. 
Throughout his life, so far as is known, he made no move 
toward giving it to the public. At his death it passed to a 
nephew, and so descended through various hands until the 
Eevolution, when it disappeared, and its loss was long 
mourned by historians. In 1855 it was discovered in the 
library of the Bishop of London, and has since been restored 
to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 

Throughout his history the author introduces copies of 

letters and of official documents, and evidently strives to 

leave an impartial record. The narrative is usually plain 

and straight-forward, but both matter and manner are tinged 

with the fanaticism of the day. To the writer's mind every 

event that favors the Pilgrims or confounds their enemies 

is the result of a direct intervention of Providence. 

And I may not omite hear a spetian worke of Gods providence. 
Ther was a proud & very profane yonge man, one of the sea-men, 
of a iustie, able body, which made him the more hauty ; he would 
allway be contemning the poore people in their siknes, & cursing 
them dayly with greevous execrations, and did not let to tell them, 



The Colonial Time 27 

that he hoped to help to cast halfe of them over board before they 
came to their jurneys end, and to make mery with what they had ; 
and if he were by any gently reproved, he would curse and swear 
most bitterly. But it plased God before they came halfe seas over, 
to smite this yong man with a greeveous disease, of which he dyed 
in a desperate maner, and so was him selfe the first that was throwne 
overbord. Thus his curses light on his owne head. 

Of the destruction of the Pequots he writes : 

Those that scaped the fire were slaine with the sword ; some hewed 
to peeces, others rune throw with their rapiers, so as they were 
quickly dispachte, and very few escaped. It was conceived they thus 
destroyed about 400. at this time. It was a fearfull sight to see 
them thus frying in the fyer, and the streams of blood quenching the 
same, and horrible was the stinck & sente ther of ; but the victory 
seemed a sweete sacrifice, and they gave the prays thereof to God, 
who had wrought so wonderfuly for them, thus to inclose their 
enimise in their hands, and give them so speedy a victory over so 
proud & insulting an enimie. 

This is in the manner of an Hebrew historian. It was, 
indeed, the Old Testament and the Booh of Revelation, 
rather than the milder gospels and epistles, which chiefly 
influenced the literary expression of early New England. 
In 1646, looking with astonishment at the success of the 
Puritan party in England, Bradford breaks into this strain 
of triumph : 

Full litle did I thinke that the downfall of the Bishops, with 
their courts, cannons, & ceremonies, &c. had been so neare, when I 
first begane these scribled writings (which was aboute the year 1630, 
and so peeced up at times of leasure afterward), or that I should 
have lived to have scene or heard of the same ; but it is the Lords 
doing, and ought to be marvelous in our eyes! Every plante which 
mine heavenly father hath not planted (saith our Saviour) shall be 
rooted up. Mat : 15. 13. I have snared the, and thou art taken, O 
Babell (Bishops), and thou wast not aware; thou art found, and 
also caught, because thou hast striven against the Lord. Jer. 
50. 24. . . . 

But who hath done it? Who, even he that siteth on the white 
horse, who is caled faithful!, & true, and judgeth and fighteth right- 
eously, Rev : 19. 11. whose garments are dipte in blood, and his name 



28 American Literature 

was caled the word of God, v. 13. for he shall rule them with a 
rode of iron ; for it is he that treadeth the winepress of the feircenes 
and wrath of God almighty. And he hath upon his garments, and 
upon his thigh, a name writen, The King of Kings, and Lord of 
Lords. V. 15, 16. Hallelu-iah. 

The first governor and the first historian of the colony at 

Massachusetts Bay was John Winthrop (1588-1649). Like 

« . , many of the early Puritans, he was a person 

John Winthrop , -^ • i x • t^ i i i ^ 

of some weight m Ji/ngland, a member of a 

good family, a lawyer, and a man of considerable wealth. 
Such a person, even when moved by the deepest religious 
impulses, naturally looks at life more broadly than a man 
like Bradford, whose experiences since childhood had been 
closely bound up with the persecutions of a despised sect. 
This difference in point of view may be traced in his history. 
There is less of the rhapsodical use of scriptural phrase- 
ology, more of the calm and matter-of-fact treatment of 
events. That Winthrop was capable of true eloquence when 
occasion demanded is shown by his speech delivered on the 
occasion of his arraignment for some alleged usurpation of 
power in his office as governor. In this he speaks with the 
system and logi<j of a trained lawyer, and with the high 
devotion to an ideal that always characterized him as a man. 
The style of his History of New England is partly deter- 
mined by the fact that the narrative is in the form of a diary. 
The first entry begins ''Easter Monday, March 29, 1630. 
Biding at the Cowes, near the Isle of Wight, in the Arbella, 
a ship of three hundred and fifty tons,^^ and the last is in the 
year 1649. As is usual in a journal of this kind kept by a 
busy man, the scale is far from uniform, but most events of 
importance are at least mentioned, and many are discussed 
at some length. There is always a fascination in the read- 
ing of a journal, arising from the incongruity of events that 
are by chance brought together. The following are suc- 
cessive entries : 



The Colonial Time ' 29 

Thomas Morton adjudged to be imprisoned, till he were sent into 
England, and his house burnt down, for his many injuries offered 
to the Indians, and other misdemeanours. Capt. Brook, master of 
the Gift, refused to carry him. 

Finch, of Watertown, had his wigwam burnt and all his goods. 

Billington executed at Plimouth for murdering one. 

Here and there are records of casualties, or discussions of 
church policy, that, though trivial to us, doubtless furnished 
the subjects of conversation for many days in the young 
colony : 

Mr. Maverick, one of the ministers of Dorchester, in drying a little 
powder, (which took fire by the heat of the fire pan) fired a small 
barrel of two or three pounds, yet did no other harm but singed 
his clothes. It was in the new meeting-house, which was thatched, 
and the thatch only blacked a little. 

After much deliberation and serious advice, the Lord directed the 
teacher, Mr, Cotton, to make it clear by the scripture, that the 
minister's maintenance, as well as all other charges of the church, 
should be defrayed out of a stock, or treasury, which was to be 
raised out of the weekly contribution ; which accordingly was agreed 
upon. 

Interspersed with such passages as these are, of course, 
references to graver matters. The question of the red cross 
in the banner of England, and the treason implied in its 
removal by Endicott (made familiar to most readers by 
Hawthorne^s story), is the subject of many entries. Here, 
too, as in Bradford's history, are special providences : 

A remarkable providence appeared in a case, which was tried at 
the last court of assistants. Divers neighbors of Lynn, by agreement, 
kept their cattle by turns. It fell out to the turn of one Gillow 
to keep them, and, as he was driving them forth, another of these 
neighbors went along with him, and kept him so earnestly in talk, 
that his cattle strayed and gate in the corn. Then this other neighbor 
left him, and would not help him recover his cattle, but went and told 
another how he had kept Gillow in talk, that he might lose his cattle, 
etc. The cattle, getting into the Indian corn, eat so much ere they 
could be gotten out, that two of them fell sick of it, and one of them 
died presently ; and these two cows were that neighbor's, who had 
kept Gillow in talk, etc. 



30 American Literature 

It is noticeable^ and perhaps significant, that while these 
observed cases of divine interference are most frequently 
mentioned in the first part of Bradford's history, they are 
more common in the later part of Winthrop's. With this 
tendency to observe remarkable providences came also a cred- 
ulity regarding supernatural sights and sounds that could 
be ascribed only to an evil power. Can it be said that as the 
Pilgrim, after his hardships in England and Holland, gained 
the beginnings of material prosperity, he noticed fewer dis- 
pensations of Providence; while the Puritan, coming from 
a more comfortable and conventional position in life, felt 
himself increasingly awed by the mystery of a new land ? 

Thomas Morton (?-1646) differed greatly from Bradford 
and Winthrop, both as a man and as an author. The exact 
_ facts regarding his life are somewhat in 

doubt, for his own story and that of the 
Puritans do not agree, and probably neither is entirely trust- 
worthy. It is known, however, that he was a Cavalier and 
a member of the Church of England, who in the early years 
of the Plymouth settlement held a plantation and trading 
post at Mount Wollaston, or Merry Mount. Here, with a 
few companions of the same sort, he traded with the Indians, 
and enjoyed life according to his disposition. His presence 
was not pleasing to the Pilgrims, who found that he inter- 
fered with their trade in beaver, and who were especially 
troubled because his way of life was not theirs. As good 
Governor Bradford complains: 

They aUso set up a May-pole, drinking and dancing aboute it 
many days togeather, inviting the Indean women, for their consorts, 
dancing and frisking togither, (like so many fairies, or furies rather,) 
and worse practises. As if they had anew revived & celebrated the 
feasts of the Roman Goddes Flora, or the beasly practieses of the 
madd Bacchanalians. Morton likewise (to shew his poetrie) com- 
posed sundry rimes & verses, some tending to lasciviousnes, and 
others to the detraction & scandall of some persons, which he aflSxed 
to this idle or idoll May-polle. They chainged allso the name of 



The Colonial Time 31 

their place, and in stead of calling it Mounte Wollaston, they call it 
Merie-mounte, as if this joylity would have lasted ever. 

Nothing was to be merry in the jurisdiction of Governor 
Bradford, and it was probably his mirth fully as much as 
other offenses that called down condemnation on Morton. It 
was charged that he sold arms to the Indians, a serious 
offense, though by no means uncommon. The "lascivious^^ 
verses affixed to the May-Pole are extant, and though they 
are poor poetry and rather foolish, they contain nothing that 
need offend the veriest prude. Offenses with the Indian 
women, hinted rather than charged, are not to be excused 
according to the rules of strict morality, though they were 
treated as a matter of course by the settlers in many parts 
of the country. To the Pilgrims, however, Morton^s sins had 
no palliation ; and they seized him and twice transported him 
to England, whence he returned to be still more harshly 
treated. He was never brought to trial, and indeed it is 
doubtful if he was guilty of any serious offense punishable 
under English law. While in England he allied himself 
with those persons who were working to secure a revocation 

of the charter of Massachusetts, and his book, 
ew ng s ^YiQ j^QiD English Canaan, was evidently 

intended to aid this party. This was prob- 
ably written about 1634 or 1635, and was published at Am- 
sterdam in 1637. It extols the country in extravagant terms, 
praises the Indians, and condemns the Puritans, and 
endeavours to show that the latter, by their intolerant exclu- 
sion of all other settlers, prevent the development of a rich 
and prosperous English colony. 

Morton was a careless, hap-hazard writer, and to his own 
inaccuracies were probably added those of the foreign 
printer. His descriptions tend toward extravagance in a 
way that suggests his connection with the Elizabethan writers 
and the Cavaliers, rather than with the Puritans : 



33 American Literature 

And when I had more seriously considered of the bewty of the 
place, with all her faire indowments, I did not thinke that in all 
the knowne world it could be paraleFd, for so many goodly groves 
of trees, dainty fine round rising hillucks, delicate faire large plaines, 
sweete cristall fountaines, and cleare running streames that twine 
in fine meanders through the meads, making so sweete a murmering 
noise to heare as would even lull the sences with delight a sleepe, 
so pleasantly doe they glide upon the pebble stones, jetting most 
jocundly where they doe meete and hand in hand runne downe to 
Neptunes Court, to pay the yearely tribute which they owe to him 
as soveraigne Lord of all the springs. 

The most interesting part of the New English Canaan is 
the third section, which treats of the settlers "together with 
their Tenents and practise of their Church/^ A vein of face- 
tiousness runs through this which makes it amusing, even'* 
when it is manifestly unfair. Here is to be found the story, 
afterward used by Butler in "Hudibras/^ of the proposition 
to hang an old and bedridden man in place of a young hunter 
who had committed a theft, because the real culprit could 
not be spared. The author is fond of contemptuous nick- 
names, and never fails to refer to Miles Standish as "Cap- 
tain Shrimp.^^ He is master of a clever though superficial 
wit, which he employs time after time at the expense of his 
persecutors, as when he says : 

And lastly they differ from us in the manner of praying; for they 
winke^ when they pray, because they think themselves so perfect in 
the highe way to heaven, that they can find it blindfold : so doe not I. 

From all that can be learned and conjectured Morton wasi 
an irresponsible, roistering sort of fellow, who took every- 
thing, even his troubles with the colonists, as 
Character ^ \iVigQ joke. No doubt Plymouth was well 

off without him, but it is hard not to give 
him some sympathy, and impossible not to be amused 
by his book. His presence in New England suggests 
the interesting if profitless inquiry what American history 

1 Winke — close the eyes. Morton of course read his prayerbook when he prayed. 



The Colonial Time 33 

would have been if the Englishman of his type, rather 
than the Puritan, had dominated the Northern colonies. 
This thought and the picturesqueness of Merry Mount seen 
against the sombre Puritan background have attracted the 
attention of more than one romancer. Hawthorne's story 
"The May-Pole of Merry Mounf' is well known; John 
Lothrop Motley's Merry Mount is a more serious though 
less successful attempt to use the same material. Altogether, 
the student of colonial literature is likely to spend more 
time on the New English Canaan than its merits warrant, 
and to conclude as Governor Bradford concluded his account 
of Morton and Merry Mount: "But I have been too long 
about so unworthy a person and bad a cause.'' 

In a community where every one could read and write 
it was to be expected that many persons of all conditions 
would leave behind them formal histories or the materials 
for history. It is hard to choose the most important, but one 
or two may be mentioned as typical of various classes. 

Captain John Mason (1600P-1672), the hero of the con- 
flict between the whites and the Indians in 1637, was re- 
quested by the General Court of Connecti- 
John Mason i ± 'i j. i? i • i 

cut to write an account oi his campaign, and 

did so in a work afterward published as A Brief History of 
the Pequot War. Captain Mason was an Englishman trained 
to war in the Low Countries, and a good specimen of the 
devout and unrelenting fighter. His narrative has some- 
thing of a soldier's bluntness, and shows delight in the out- 
come of the conflict both as a soldier's work well performed 
and as an evidence of the Providence of God. 

In 1654 there was issued in London a work entitled A His- 

tory of New England from the English planting in the Yeere 

1628 untill the Yeere 1652, but since known 

by the running title of The Wonder-Working 

Providence of Sions Saviour in New England, This pic- 



34 American Literature 

turesque history was the work of Edward Johnson (1599- 
1672), a native of Kent and an early emigrant to Woburn, 
Massachusetts ; and it is one of the best examples of the kind 
of writing produced by a devout but wholly uncultured 
Puritan layman. Johnson^s object was to correct false 
reports about the country, and to show that the development 
of New England had been under the direct and immediate 
guidance of Providence. He gives a painstaking statement 
of many occurrences, but his work is chiefly valuable not as 
history but as an exemplification of the ideals and modes of 
thought that were widely diffused in the land. Perhaps the 
most noticeable characteristic of his style is a tendency to hit 
upon striking phrases, odd metaphors and hyperboles, often 
suggesting if not borrowed from the language of Scripture 
and current religious discourse. Expressions like the follow- 
ing abound : 

With these words they lift up their voyces and wept, adding many 
drops of salt liquor to the ebbing Ocean. 

The daylight being clouded with a gross vapor, as if nights 
Curtaines remained half shut. 

So they came over this boysterous billow-boyling Ocean, a few 
poor scattered stones newly raked out of the heaps of rubbish. 

These turns of phrase and figure seem most of them to 
come spontaneously, but sometimes there are evidences of a 
mighty effort to find a comparison. Dorchester is thus de- 
scribed : 

The forme of this Town is almost like a serpent turning her head 
to the Northward : over against Tompsons Island, and the Castle, her 
body and wings being chiefly built on, are filled somewhat thick of 
Houses, onely that one of her wings is dipt, her Tayle being of 
such a large extent that she can hardly draw it after her. 

Among the less important historians was Nathaniel Morton 
(1613-1685), the nephew of Governor Bradford, to whom 
the manuscript history of Plymouth descended. His New 
England's Memoriall, an account of the early years of the 



The Colonial Time 35 

colony^ published in 1669, was long regarded as one of 
the most valuable authorities for American history. Since 

the discovery of Bradford's manuscript in 
Minor Historical 1355 j^ has been found that the most im- 
Writers portant parts of Morton's work are copied 

literally, page after page, from his uncle's ac- 
count. As Morton had access to other manuscripts now lost, 
which he probably used in the same way, it is hard to say what 
part of the Memoriall is really his own. It is not easy to 
draw the line between historians and authors who only 
furnish the materials for history. Closely connected with 
the true historians were a number of men who made almost 
equally valuable contributions to our knowledge of early New 
England, but who wrote for an immediate end. The Eever- 
end Francis Higgeson (1587-1630), or, as the name was later 
spelled, Higginson, came from England to the church at 
Salem in 1629. Like many other passengers on sea-going 
vessels at that time, he kept a journal of his voyage, which 
he sent back to England, where it was immediately published. 
He was a born observer, and later in the same year he wrote 
and sent to London for publication New Englands Planta- 
tion, or a Short and True Description of the Commodities 
and Discommodities of that Countrey, This is a brief, well 
planned, and on the whole well written description of the 
country, a little pedantic in style, as became the writing of 
a Cambridge-educated divine. Another early description of 
America is Neiu Englands Prospect, by William Wood. The 
author probably came to America in 1629, and returned in 
1633. Whether he ever came back is uncertain, and it may 
be that his book was written in England. It is more com- 
plete and systematic than most works of its kind, treating 
of the country, its climate, beasts, birds, fishes, inhabitants, 
and also ^^Of the evills and such things as are hurtfuU in the 
Plantation." A peculiarity of the authoT's style is his ex- 



36 American Literature 

cessive use of adjectives^ sometimes as many as twelve or 
fifteen to one substantive. Perhaps the best descriptions of 
the aborigines in New England were written by Daniel 
Gookin (1612-1687), who long held the office of superintend- 
ent of the Indians in the colony of Massachusetts. His main 
concern for the Indians was the salvation of their souls, and 
he wrote with the purpose of showing their capabilities and 
the need of missionary work among them. His Historical 
Collections of the Indians in New England was dedicated to 
Charles II in 1674, but for some reason remained unpublished. 
He also completed a history of New England on a large scale, 
but the manuscript is supposed to have been destroyed by 
fire. John Josselyn, who twice visited America, and who 
spent, in all, some ten years in the colonies, is the author of 
two picturesque works: New England's Rarities Discovered, 
in Birds, Beasts, Fishes, Serpents, and Plants of that 
Country, &c., published in 1672, and An Account of two 
Voyages to New England, &c., 1674. Josselyn was a man 
of family and education, and not much in sympathy with the 
Puritan strictness of New England. He was chiefly inter- 
ested in natural science, if the word science can be used in 
connection with his method; for he records in the most 
credulous fashion not only what he observes or thinks he 
observes, but everything that he is told. His writings have 
the attractiveness that belongs to a combination of a 
child^s book of wonders and a summary of quaint and for- 
gotten theories. 

By far the most significant writings produced in early New 
England were those which dealt with religion and theology. 
Few of these deserve the strict title of liter- 
W Yn^s^ ature; still fewer are fairly readable to-day. 

Their value comes from their intimate con- 
nection with the life of the people — from the fact that on 
the one hand they were the chief influence in moulding liter- 



The Colonial Time 37 

ary taste, and that, on the other hand, they show the liter- 
ary demands made by the public. 

These writings were the work of the Puritan clergy, and 
in order to understand them it is necessary to know some- 
thing of their authors. The most notable 

f J »^^. X ^" char^acteristic of the ministers of the New 

land Ministers ^ . ^ . . ^ i - ^ ^ ,. 

England churches was the high degree of 

culture — or more accurately of learning — that they repre- 
sented. As a^ rule they were Cambridge men who had made 
their University studies, like everything else in their lives, 
a matter of conscientious duty. The field that they covered 
was not large, but they knew with the utmost thoroughness 
Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and the intricate mazes of church 
doctrine. Nor were these subjects for the private study 
alone. Earely was a sermon printed without a motto in one 
of the learned tongues. The accuracy of translations of the 
Scriptures was often discussed in the pulpit. Quotations 
from Greek, Latin, and Hebrew were common in sermons, 
and even in prayers ; and almost every pulpit discourse, even 
those intended for unlearned hearers, dealt with questions 
of doctrine that would to-day be considered too abstruse for 
the most intellectual congregation. This does not mean that 
our ancestors were prodigies; but such powers of mind as 
they had they were trained from childhood to exercise upon 
questions of theology. Besides, the sermon was not a matter 
for the hour only. It was the theme of conversation and of 
private meditation throughout the week; and that defects of 
memory might not interfere with a full mastery of its intri- 
cacies, auditors were accustomed to bring to the meetinghouse 
pencil and paper and take notes. 

The published writings of the early ministers were largely 
sermons, either singly or in series that formed virtual 
systems of church doctrine, or manuals of church practice. 
They also issued tracts and pamphlets on various subjects* 



38 American Literature 

For the minister was not only a spiritual teacher^ but a 
leader and an almost infallible guide in public affairs, the 
interpreter of God's will to a people with whom the wishes 
of Providence were supposed to control every act of life. 
They were consulted at every step by legislators, governors, 
and judges. These men are most of them remembered as 
powerful influences in the colony, not as authors of any par- 
ticular works of importance. It may be well, therefore, to 
sketch briefly the lives of some of the most prominent of them 
and afterward to notice some of the more general character- 
istics of their writings. 

The foremost minister of the first half-century in Massa- 
chusetts was John Cotton (1585-1652). He was born in 
Derby, England, and took his degree at Em- 
jo on manuel College, Cambridge. After making a 
brilliant record at the University he associated himself with 
the Puritan party, and became pastor of a church at Boston, 
England. It was in honor of this church and its illustrious 
pastor that .the chief town of Massachusetts was given its 
name. When, in 1633, he was driven from England by the 
persecutions of Archbishop Laud, the leader of the anti- 
Puritan party, he came to the new Boston, where he was 
made teacher and later pastor of the famous First Church. 
His published works include, besides his controversy with 
Eoger Williams, which will be mentioned later, such titles as : 
A Brief Exposition upon Ecclesiastes; The Grounds and Ends 
of the Baptism of the Children of the Faithful; A Treatise 
concerning Predestination; A Modest and Clear Answer to 
Mr. BalVs Discourse of Set Forms of Prayer; and the classic 
New England catechism, usually known as Spiritual Milk 
for Boston Babes, It is not of course by any of these tracts 
and sermons that his power is to be estimated. It was 
through his personal force and his pulpit oratory that he 
became and long remained the real leader of the common- 



The Colonial Time 39 

wealth, determining the policy of the government as well as 
that of the church. 

This sketch of the life of John Cotton migfit almost serve 

as the biography of most of his prominent colleagues. Among 

these was Thomas Hooker (1586-1647). He 

omas 00 er ^^^ |^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^ ^j^^^ Cotton, was 

also a graduate of Emmanuel College; and was also driven 
from England by Laud, from whence he went first to Hol- 
land, but afterward to America, crossing the ocean in the 
same ship with Cotton. For three years he preached at 
Cambridge, and then, with his congregation, founded the 
town of Hartford, Connecticut. The eighteen titles of his 
published works include : The Soul's Preparation for Christ; 
or a Treatise of Contrition; The SouVs Vocation; or Effec- 
tual Calling to Christ; The Saint's Dignity and Duty, 

When Hooker left Cambridge in 1636 his successor in the 
pulpit was Thomas Shepard (1605-1649), another graduate 
of Emmanuel, and another victim of Laud. 
Sh^°^^d Among his publications are: New England's 

Lamentations for Old England's Errours; 
Certain Select Cases Resolved; The Clear Sunshine of the 
Gospel breaking forth upon the Indians in New England, 
His writings are somewhat more readable to-day than those 
of either Cotton or Hooker. 

Cotton, Hooker, and Shepard seem at this distance to 
stand out above their many devout and learned contempo- 
raries, though it would be rash to say with certainty who were 
really the ablest among the many early New England divines. 
As has been said, in the history of literature they count more 
as a class than as individuals. Great as were their differ- 
ences in temperament, the overwhelming fact of their creed 
seems to have reduced their methods of expression to a con- 
siderable sameness. 

The most noticeable characteristic of the writings of these 



40 American Literature 

men is logical exactness. A sermon of those days was not a 
superficial discussion of a subject, but a thorough investiga- 
tion of every point involved. Two hours was 
ew ngan ^ usual length for such a discourse, and any 
important topic was treated in a series of dis- 
courses. The parishioner with his notebook was trained to 
close thinking; and the sermon was arranged in numbered 
headings and subheadings that suggest a modern college 
textbook on an abstruse subject. 

This closeness of analysis is best seen in sermons on doc- 
trinal points; and to appreciate the logical structure it is 
necessary to study a discourse as a whole. Every American, 
certainly every American of New England ancestry, should 
as a filial duty read at least one of these learned theological 
discussions, to which his forefathers listened week after week. 
More interesting and more readily quoted, though really less 
significant, are the hortatory or damnatory sermons occa- 
sionally preached to warn the hearers of the wrath to come. 
The horrors of future punishment offered one of the few 
subjects on which the Puritan allowed his imagination free 
play ; and it sometimes seems as if he took an exultant pleas- 
ure in the vivid picturing of eternal torment. Thomas 
Shepard thus describes the dialogue between the Judge and 
a lost soul at the last day : 

In regard of the fearful sentence that then shall be passed upon 
thee ; Depart thou cursed creature into everlasting fire, prepared for 
the devil and his Angels. Thou shalt then cry out. Oh mercy, Lord ! 
Oh a little mercy ! No, will the Lord Jesus say, I did indeed once 
offer it you, but you refused, therefore Depart. Then thou shalt 
plead again, Lord if I must depart, yet blesse me before I go : No, no, 
Depart thou cursed. Oh but. Lord, if I must depart cursed, let me 
go into some good place : No, depart thou cursed into hell fire. Oh 
Lord, that's a torment I cannot bear ; but if it must be so, Lord, 
let me come out again quickly ; No, depart thou cursed into ever- 
lasting fire. Oh Lord, if this be thy pleasure, that here I must abide, 
let me have good company with me. No depart thou cursed into ever- 



The Colonial Time 41 

lasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels, This shall be 
thy sentence. . . . 

Theytorment which wisdome shall devise, the Almighty power of 
God/^all inflict upon thee, so as there was never such power seen 
in nicking the world, as in holding a poor creature under this wrath, 
that holds up the soul in being with one hand, and beats it with the 
other, ever burning like fire against a creature, and yet that creature 
never burnt up, Rom. 9. 22. Think not this cruelty, it*s justice. 
. . . Thou canst not endure the torments of a little Kitchin fire on 
the tip of thy finger, not one half hour together; how wilt thou 
bear the fury of this infinite, endlesse, consuming fire in body and 
soul throughout all eternity? ... 

Thus (I say) thou shalt lie blaspheming, with Gods wrath like a 
pile of fire on thy soul burning, and floods, nay seas, nay more, 
seas of tears (for thou shalt forever lie weeping) shall never quench 
it. And here which way soever thou lookest thou shalt see matter 
of everlasting grief. Look up to Heaven, and there thou shalt see 
(Oh) that God is for ever gone. liook about thee, thou shalt see 
Devils quaking, cursing God ; and thousands, nay millions of sinfuU, 
damned creatures crying and roaring out with dolefuU shriekings : 
Oh the day that ever I was born ! 

Besides sermons and tracts the chief publications of the 
clergy were controversial writings. Most typical are those 
regarding some technicality of theology; 
Writ^nT^^^^ others were concerned with matters of church 
discipline, such as methods of baptism^ or 
the right of women to sing psalms at public worship. An 
interesting example^ both from the importance of the ques- 
tion discussed and the prominence of the participants, is that 
between John Cotton and Roger Williams concerning perse- 
cution for religious belief. 

This controversy had its origin in England before the 
emigration of the Puritans to America. An unknown pris- 
oner, confined in Newgate because of his reli- 
John Cotton w. . t ± - ± 

Roger Williams ^^^^' composed some arguments against per- 
secution and sent them to a friend outside the 
prison, employing the device familiar to every child of using 
miJk as a sympathetic ink. These arguments were pub- 
lished ; and a part of them were sent to John Cotton with a 



42 ' American Literature 

request for his opinion upon them. In reply Cotton wrote 
a letter, which was printed just at the time that Williams 
visited England for the purpose of obtaining a charter for 
Ehode Island. To this letter Williams wrote a hasty reply, 
published under the title The Bloudy Tenent of Persecu- 
tion for cause of Conscience, discussed in a Conference he- 
tween Truth and Peace. When this reached America Cotton 
wrote a rejoinder entitled The Bloody Tenent washed and 
7nade white in the Blood of the Lamb; and this in turn called 
forth from Williams The Bloody Tenent yet More Bloody: by 
Mr. Cottons endevour to wash it white in the Blood of the 
Lambe. 

The modern reader of this discussion is struck by the fact 
that so much of it is made up of direct appeals to Scripture, 
and especially to the symbolical parts of Scripture. The 
prisoner in Newgate gives as his first argument against per- 
secution, not the inhumanity and injustice of such treatment, 
but: 

Because Christ commandeth that the Tares and Wheat (which 
some understand are those that walke in the Truth and those that 
walke in Lies) should be let alone in the World, and not plucked up 
untill the Harvest, which is the end of the World, Math. 13. 36. 
88. &c. 

This is followed by other similar scriptural arguments ; and 

it is largely to these that Cotton devotes himself in his reply. 

Thus, to the passage quoted, he says : 

Tares are not Bryars and Thornes, but partly Hypocrites, like 
unto the godly, but indeed carnall (as the Tares are like to Wheat 
but are not Wheat,) or partly such corrupt doctrines or practices 
as are indeed unsound, but yet such as come very near the truth 
(as Tares do to the Wheat) and so neer that good men may be 
taken with them, and so the persons in whom they grow cannot bee 
rooted out, but good Wheat will be rooted out with them. 

Arguments of other kinds are of course used by both Cotton 
and Williams, but they are supported by frequent scriptural 
citations. The tacit understanding seems to be that the con- 



The Coxonial Time 43 

troversy must be settled by appeal not to the spirit but to 
the letter of the Word of God. 

One controversial pamphlet must almost be placed in a 
class by itself. This is The Simple Cobler of Aggawamm, 

by Nathaniel Ward (1579P-1652?). The 

Nathaniel Ward ,. ii j? ii j j. i? in 

author was another oi the graduates oi iiim- 

manuel College^ Cambridge^ but instead, of passing at once 
from the University to the ministry^ he studied and prac- 
ticed law, travelled much, and saw the world. Finally he 
took orders, and soon afterward, like most of his Puritan 
brethren, suffered the displeasure of Laud. He came to 
America in 1634, and settled as pastor of the church at 
Aggawam, afterwards Ipswich. Owing to ill health he 
resigned his pastorate after three years, but he continued to 
reside in the colony until 1647, when he returned to England. 
The Simple Cohler was begun in 1645 and was published in 
London in 1647. On the title-page the author assumes the 
character of a poor cobbler ^Villing to help mend his Native 
Country, lamentably tattered, both in the upper-leather and 
sole, with all the honest stitches he can take. And as willing 
never to bee paid for his work, by Old English wonted pay.^^ 
He makes no attempt, however, to write in the manner of 
a cobbler. The work may be characterized as a satire on 
things in general, and a manual of advice to English Puri- 
tans, especially to the Parliament. Nathaniel Ward^s 
breadth of experience had not given him breadth of mind, 
and the first pages of his book are devoted to an intense 
tirade against religious toleration: 

It is said, That Men ought to have Liberty of their Conscience, 
and that it is persecution to debarre them of it : I can rather stand 
amazed then reply to this : it is an astonishment to think that the 
braines of men should be parboyFd in such impious ignorance ; Let 
all the wits under the Heavens lay their heads together and finde an 
Assertion worse then this (one excepted) I will petition to be chosen 
the. univer sail Ideot of the world. 



44 American Literature 

This passage represents the style of the author when he is 
most conventional. When he wishes to be forcible, he uses 
outlandish words coined by himself, quotations from the 
Latin, and figures that have the same eflEectiveness as those 
of modern slang : 

It is a most toylsome taske to run the wild-goose chase after a 
weU-breath'd Opinionist : they delight in vitilitigation : it is an itch 
that loves alife to be scrub'd : they desire not satisfaction, but 
eatisdiction, whereof themselves must be judges : yet in new erup- 
tions of Error with new objections, silence is sinfull. 

The reverend author does not exhaust his vocabulary in 
attacking religious toleration, but pays his respects to women 
of fashion in a still more forcible manner. The following is 
a comparatively mild passage: 

It is a more common then convenient saying, that nine Taylors 
make a man : it were well if nineteene could make a woman to her 
minde : if Taylors were men indeed, well furnished but with meer 
morall principles, they would disdain to be led about like Apes, by 
such mymick Marmosets. It is a most unworthy thing, for men that 
have bones in them, to spend their lives in making fidle-cases for 
futulous womens phansies ; which are the very pettitoes of Infirmity, 
the giblets of perquisquilian toyes. 

The latter part of the work is given over to a discussion of 
contemporary affairs in England. Here are opinions as out- 
spoken as those on toleration. Of the Irish after the mas- 
sacres of 1641 he says: 

I begge upon my hands and knees, that the Expedition against 
them may be undertaken while the hearts and hands of our Souldiery 
are hot, to whom I will be bold to say briefly : Happy is he that 
shaU reward them as they have served us, and Cursed be he that shall 
do that work of the Lord negligently. Cursed be he that holdeth back 
his Sword from blood : yea. Cursed be he that maketh not his Sword 
Starke drunk with Irish blood, that doth not recompence them double 
for their hellish treachery to the English^ that maketh them not 
heaps upon heaps, and their Country a dwelling place for Dragons, 
an Astonishment to Nations : Let not that eye look for pity, nor that 
hand to be spared, that pities or spares them, and let him be 
accursed, that curseth not them bitterly. 



The Colonial Time 45 

The peculiarities of the Simple C oiler are explained partly 
by the author^s personality and partly by the fact that he 
was writing for English readers. It is an example of that 
rough-and-ready pamphleteering which was less necessary in 
the colonies, but which to many lower-class Englishmen of 
CromwelFs time must have been more effective than the 
systematic presentation of arguments buttressed with appeals 
to Scripture. That the work was popular with the classes 
for whom it was written is shown by the fact that it went 
through four London editions in less than a year. More 
recently it has been regarded chiefly as a literary curiosity. 
The oddities of the author^s manner have drawn attention 
from his matter — and the result has perhaps been fortunate 
for his reputation. Eead for its ideas alone, the work is an 
exhibition of narrowness and bigotry unusual even in Puri- 
tan times. 

Contemporary biographies record the learning and the 
virtues of many other early New England ministers, most of 

whom published at least a few sermons and 
mor lenca tracts that were admired in their day. Few 

of these men, however, deserve a place in a 
literary history. Charles Chauncy (1592-1672), a graduate 
of Trinity College, Cambridge, came to America in 1638, 
and settled first at Plymouth and then at Scituate. In 1654 
he became president of Harvard college. His publications 
include two volumes of sermons, and a controversial work 
entitled Antisynodalia Americana. Because of his illustrious 
descendants rather than of his own work mention should be 
made of Eichard Mather (1596-1669), the father of Increase, 
the father of Cotton. Unlike most of his Puritan brethren 
he was educated at Oxford. When he was driven from Eng- 
land by Laud he came to America in 1635 and was for many 
years pastor at Dorchester. His publications, besides his 
part in the Bay Psalm Booh, were mostly sermons. 



46 American Literature 

There was almost no poetry, in any strict sense of the term, 

produced by the early New England colonists. Verses, or 

attempts at verses, were common, and were 
C&rlv Verses 

^ made by almost every one who wrote at all. 

Governor Bradford put in rhyme many economic facts re- 
garding New England : 

Cattle of every kind do ^i!^ the land ; 

Many are now kilFd, and their hides tann'd : 

By which men are supply*d with meat and shoes, 

Or what they can, though much by wolves they lose. 

Other writers composed jingles of the sort current in En- 
gland during the troubled political times — saws intended 
to stitik in the popular mind, and to express a general truth 
so as to suggest its application, perhaps in a treasonable way, 
to current events. Nathaniel Ward furnishes several 
examples of these couplets in the Simple Cobler, 

In ending wars 'tween Subjects and their Kings, 
Great things are sav'd by losing little things. 

The body beares the head, the head the Crown, 
If both beare not alike, then one will down. 

Verses were also used for no other apparent purpose than to 

relieve the monotony of prose. William Wood, in his New 

England's Prospect, often puts catalogues of plants, trees, 

animals, etc., in verse: 

The Turkey-Phesant, Heathcocke, Partridge rare. 
The carrion-tearing Crow, and hurtful Stare, 
The long liv'd Raven, th' ominous Screech-Owle 
Who tells, as old wives say, disasters foule. 

The most common use of verses was, however, as memorial 
tributes. At the death of any minister or public man his 

friends felt called upon to express their grief 
Memorial -^ rhymed lines. These show perhaps better 

that anything else the esthetic barrenness of 
the times. They abound in puns, quibbles, and conceits. 
Some of them show, as well as commemorate, great learning; 



The Colonial Time 47 

but not one of them impresses a reader to-day as the heart- 
felt expression of a true emotion. A very few examples of 
this kind of literature must suffice. On the death of Thomas 
Hooker, Peter Bulkley wrote : 

Let Hartford sigh, and say, IVe lost a treasure ; 

Let aU New England mourn at God's displeasure, 

In taking from us one more gracious. 

Than is the gold of Ophir precious, 

Sweet was the savour which his grace did give, 

It season'd all the place where he did live. 

His name did as an ointment give it smell, 

And all bear witness that it savoured well. 

The death of John Cotton called forth many effusions, one 

of the best of which was by John Norton : 

And after Winthrop's Hooker's, Shepard's hearse. 
Doth Cotton's death call for a mourning verse? 
Thy will be done. Yet lord, who dealest thus, 
Make this great death expedient for us. 

That comets, great men's deaths do oft forego. 
This present comet doth too sadly show. 
This prophet dead, yet must in's doctrine speak, 
This comet saith, else must New England break. 
Whate'er it be, the heavens avert it far, 
That meteors should succeed our greatest star. 
In Boston's orb, Winthrop and Cotton were ; 
These lights extinct, dark is our hemisphere. 

Morton^s Memoriall, the great storehouse of these eulogies; 
preserves this gem: 

The ninth of May, about nine of the clock, 
A precious one God out of Plimouth took ; 
Governor Bradford then expired his breath, 
Was call'd away by force of cruel death. 

The following^ on the death of the Eeverend Mr. Norton and 

the Eeverend Mr. Stone, is more ingenious : 

Last spring this summer may be autumn styl'd. 
Sad withering fall our beauties which despoil'd ; 
Two choicest plants, our Norton and our Stone, 
Your justs threw down ; remov'd, away are gone. 



48 American Literature 

One year brought Stone and Norton to their mother, 
In one year April, July did them smother. 

A stone more than the Ebenezer fam'd ; 
Stone splendent diamond, right orient nam*d ; 
A cordial stone, that often cheered hearts 
With pleasant wit, with Gospel rich imparts ; 
Whetstone that edgified th* obtusest mind; 
Loadstone, that drew the iron heart unkind. 
A ponderous stone, that would the bottom sound 
Of scripture depths, and bring out Arcan's found. 

The same limitations that are seen in these elegiac verses 

are even more noticeable in the Bay Psalm Booh. This 

rendition of the Psalms into so-called metre 

e ay sa ^^^ made by a committee of the leading min- 
isters of New England, chief among whom 
were Eichard Mather, Thomas Welde, and John Eliot. It 
was published at Cambridge in 1640, and was the first book 
printed in America. The task was undertaken because of the 
feeling that Sternhold and Hopkins^s version of the Psalms, 
which was in use among the Puritans in England, was not 
sufficiently literal. The translators endeavored to secure a 
rendering that could be sung, and yet that should adhere as 
closely as possible to the letter of the original. A glance at 
their work gives another reminder that it was the Scripture 
as Scripture, and not the spirit underlying it, that the Puri- 
tan valued. These men had no conception of poetry, and 
no skill in versification; but being without sense of humor 
they put forth their work with the feeling that they had done 
a service acceptable to the Lord. Properly to appreciate their 
readings, one must make comparison with the sonorous King 
James version, which they had before them. The first Ymv^ 
of Psalm XIX are rendered thus : 

The heavens doe declare 

the majesty of God : 
also the firmament shews forth 

his handy-work abroad. 



The Colonial Time 49 

2 Day speaks to day, knowledge 

night hath to night declarM. 

3 There neither speach nor language is, 

where their voyce is not heard. 

4 Through all the earth their line 

is gone forth & unto 
the utmost end of all the world, 
their speaches reach also. 

The first American writer who unquestionably deserves 
the title of poet was Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672). She was 
born in England in 1612, the daughter of 
Thomas Dudley, afterward governor of Mas- 
sachusetts — a thrifty old Puritan whose virtues were com- 
memorated in an epitaph by Governor Belcher: 

Here lies Thomas Dudley, that trusty old stud, 
A bargain's a bargain, and must be made good. 

At the age of sixteen she was married to Simon Bradstreet, 
who also became a governor of Massachusetts. In 1630, with 
father and husband, she came to New England. Here she 
removed from place to place, settling finally at Ipswich; 
attended to all the duties of a pioneer household ; became the 
mother of eight children ; suffered much from ill-health ; and, 
in addition to all this, wrote the works that entitle her to 
be placed first in the chronicle of American poets. 

Her favorite authors were the French Puritan Du Bartas; 
Quarles; and more strangely. Sir Philip Sidney, whose kins- 
woman she may have been. It was mainly by men of the 
stamp of Du Bartas and Quarles, however, that she was influ- 
enced. Her longest poems are didactic treatises on ^^The 
Four Elements,^' "The Four Humours in Man^s Constitu- 
tion,'' "The Four Ages of Man,'' "The Four Seasons of the 
Year,'' and "The Four Monarchies." These and some shorter 
pieces were first published in London in 1650 under the title 
The Tenth Muse lately sprung up in America — an ambitious 
designation for which she was in no way responsible. The 



50 American Literature 

manuscripts had been taken without her knowledge or con- 
sent by her brother-in-law^ the Keverend John Woodbridge, 
when he sailed for England in 1647, and he procured their 
publication. Later in life she wrote a few short poems, and 
a series of ^^Meditations^^ in prose which are really superior 
to her poetical work. 

Mrs. Bradstreet^s didactic poems are what might be ex- 
pected from her training. The following, from ^^The Four 
Ages of Man/^ is neither better nor worse than the average, 
and is interesting as one of two or three passages which have 
caused some critics to believe that she had read Shakespeare. 
Youth speaks: 

If any care I take 'ti'^ to be fine, 

For sure my suit, more than my virtues shine. 

If time from leud Companions I can spare 

'Tis spent to curie, and pounce my new-bought hair. 

Some new Adonis I do strive to be : 

Sardanapalus now survives in me. 

Cards, Dice, and Oathes concomitant I love, 

To playes, to masques, to Taverns still I move. 

And in a word, if what I am you'd hear, 

Seek out a Brittish, bruitish Cavaleer. 

The prologue to the poems runs rather more smoothly: 

To sing of Wars, of Captains, and of Kings, 
Of Cities founded, Common-wealths begun, 
For my mean pen are too superiour things : 
Or how they all, or each their dates have run 
Let Poets and Historians set these forth. 
My obscure Lines shall not so dim their worth. 

Probably the best of her later poems is ^^Contemplations,^^ 
which, though uneven, shows in places genuine emotion, and 
some appreciation of Nature. One stanza may serve as an 
illustration : 

Then on a stately Oak I cast mine Eye, 
Whose ruffling top the Clouds seemM to aspire ; 
How long since thou wast in thine Infancy? 
Thy strength, and stature, more thy years admire, 



The Colonial Time 51 

Hath hundred winters past since thou wast born? 
Or thousand since thou brakest thy shell of horn? 
If so, all these as nought Eternity doth scorn. 

All circumstances considered^ it is surprising that this 
busy New England matron should have written so much and 
so well. But, after all, perhaps she best deserves memory 
because among her lineal descendants were William Ellery 
Channing, Eichard Henry Dana, Wendell Phillips, and 
Oliver Wendell Holmes. 

To his contemporaries the Eeverend Michael Wigglesworth 
(1631-1705) seemed a greater poet than Anne Bradstreet; 
for he was the one man who attempted to give 
w'^ T th pontic expression to the prevailing creed and 
all that it implied. His biography resembles 
that of many other New England ministers. He was born 
in England and came to America in 1638, where he endured 
some hardships on account of the poverty of his family^ but 
was able to graduate from Harvard in 1651. He served in 
Harvard college for a time as tutor, but about 1655 was set- 
tled at Maiden, Massachusetts. Here he remained as teacher 
and pastor until his death, except for a short time when 
he went on a voyage to the Bermudas for his health. His 
early intention was to become a physician, and he progressed 
so far in his medical studies that he was able to minister to 
the bodies as well as the souls of his congregation. His f amil- 
ilarity with medical phraseology is shown in some of his 
poems. His own health was poor, and often he was unable 
to enter the pulpit. At these times he composed some of his 
verses as the only service he could offer to the Lord. 

Among Wigglesworth^s lesser poems are ^^Meat out of the 
Eater, or Meditations concerning the Necessity, End, and 
Usefulness of Affliction to God's Children'' ; and ^'God's Con- 
troversy with New England, written in the Time of the Great 
Drought." His most important production is, however. The 



52 American Literature 

Day of Doom, or a Poetical Description of the Great and Last 
Judgment, published in 1662. This contains more than two 

hundred eight-line stanzas, each resembling 
f D "^ ^ double ballad stanza, modified by the use 

of internal rhymes and of occasional feminine 
endings. The peculiar jigging movement of this verse is 
strangely out of harmony with the gravity of the theme. 
After an invocation to Christ the poet begins with the 
description of the night before the judgment. Then fol- 
low the appearance of Christ, the awakening of the liv- 
ing and the dead with the natural consternation of the 
wicked, the assembly at the judgment seat, and the parting 
of the multitude upon the right and the left hand. Then 
the righteous are awarded a place beside the Judge, and the 
wicked are given an opportunity to speak for themselves. The 
heathen who never heard the Word, the infants who died at 
birth, and others who can offer less plausible excuses, en- 
deavour to show why they should not be condemned, and each 
in turn is answered by the Judge. This part of the poem 
gives an opportunity for an exposition of Calvinistic theology, 
and especially for an answer to some of the objections com- 
monly brought against it. In the end, judgment is pro- 
nounced, and the poem closes with brief descriptions of the 
torture of the wicked and the bliss of the righteous. 

One of the best known parts of the poem is the plea of 
the infants who are denied salvation because they died before 
they could receive baptism. Is answer to their argument that 
they should not suffer eternal torture for Adam's sin, Christ 

says : Would you have grieved to have received 

through Adam so much good, 
As had been your for evermore, 

if he at first had stood? 
Would you have said, ''We ne'er obey*d 

nor did thy laws regard ; 
It ill befits with benefits, 

us, Lord, to so reward?'* 



The Colonial Time 53 

Since then to share in his welfare, 

you could have been content, 
You may with reason share in his treason, 

and in the punishment. 



and concludes : 

You sinners are, and such a share 

as sinners, may expect ; 
Such you shall have, for I do save 

none but mine own Elect. 
- Yet to compare your sin with their 

who livM a longer time, 
I do confess yours is much less, 

though every sin's a crime. 

A crime it is, therefore in bliss 

You may not hope to dwell; 
But unto you I shall allow 

the easiest room in Hell. 

The last couplet quoted^ perhaps the best known passage in 
the Day of Doom, is the one expression of the author's better 
self against the logic of his creed. Every other assertion 
is supported by marginal citations of Scripture; the conces- 
sion to the infants rests only on the poet's sense of justice. 
It is an interesting result of the conflict which men came 
more and more to feel between their humane impulses and 
the inevitable logic of their theology. 

The most remarkable fact regarding the Day of Doom 
was its popularity. Professor Tyler estimates that within a 
year after its publication a copy Tiad been sold for every 
thirty-five persons, men, women, and children, in New 
England. When the average size of families at this time is 
considered, it will be seen that a large proportion of the 
households in New England were provided with the volume. 
Its popularity continued well into, and indeed through, the 
eighteenth century. Children were required to learn it along 
with their catechism, and the aged repeated it as a comfort 
when their faith was assailed. Thousands, no doubt, read 



54 American Literature 

no other poetry. Not only was it an index of the state of 
poetic taste when it was written, but it helped in fixing 
poetic standards for several generations afterward. 

An early versifier whose name should not be wholly for- 
gotten was William Morrell. He was an Episcopalian clergy- 
man who was sent to New England in 1623 
Minor Verse ^^^.j^ ^ commission from the ecclesiastical 
Writer ^ o ^ - - 

court, but who found it wise to make no show 

of authority. His stay of a year or two resulted in a poem. 
Nova Anglia, which, as was not unusual at that time, he 
wrote in Latin and translated into English. The Latin ver- 
sion is said by those who are judges of such attempts to have 
some academic merits. The English verses move rather halt- 
ingly. There are a few good lines in the introduction, but 
the body of the poem is only a crude catalogue of plants, 
animals, and products of commercial value. 

The list of authors already given includes the most im- 
portant of those who wrote in New England during the first 
half-century of colonial life. It will be 

General Char- noticed that all of them were born in England, 
acteristics of 

Early Period ^^^ most of them were educated there. Be- 
fore passing to the first generation of native 
authors it may be well to summarize the general character- 
istics of the work of these older men. In this way we shall 
get more clearly in mind the literary forces and tendencies 
that the Puritan brought from England, and so shall be 
better able to trace the course of later literary development. 
It is perhaps easier to state what is wanting than what is 
present in these writings. Both the forms and the qualities 
of composition that are most readily associ- 

^ ^^. ^^ ated with the word literature are absent. 

Wanting 

There was no drama, no fiction, no polite 
essays, and practically no poetry. There was no expression 
of love of nature, no romantic feeling, almost no lighter im- 



The Colonial Time 55 

agination. The drama and such fiction as was known at that 
time were condemned as frivolous or worse. Poetry might 
possibly have been expected, but the reasons why it was not 
written are not far to seek. All the higher literary activities 
of the Puritan were centered on the thought of the life here- 
after, rather than on this life. It is impossible to under- 
stand the writings or the actions of our forefathers without 
thoroughly grasping this fact. The church to-day repeats 
the same statement of belief in the life everlasting; but the 
church of to-day has discovered that it has duties close at 
hand and leaves the future pretty largely to itself. It is 
among less intellectual Christians that we now look for per- 
sons who really spend much time in thinking of their state 
in the New Jerusalem. It was the most intellectual among 
the Puritans who thought most of this life as a mere prepara- 
tion for the life beyond. True, the successful way in which 
they managed their concerns here shows that they must have 
given considerable time to the affairs of this world ; but when 
they wrote it was on higher things. In those days the news- 
paper had not given to reading the familiarity that breeds 
contempt, and the printed or even the written page was con- 
sidered worthy of preserving only edifying thoughts. 

This concentration of thought along one line crowded all 
lesser matters from the mind of the Puritan. He felt no 
love for nature as the poets feel it. There was little place 
in his heart for the love of woman. Love as a sensuous or 
even a romantic passion was not to be mentioned. There 
must be no sonnets to Stella or songs to Lucasta. More to 
his shame, he did not see, or at any rate did not express, the 
beauty of love within the home. Brutal as the statement 
seems, the wives of the early settlers were worn to their 
deaths by the labors of the household and the bearing and 
rearing of many children; and the bereaved husband rarely 
found it convenient or economical to depend long on a hired 



56 American Literature 

housekeeper. Most prominent men were married at least 
twice. Third and fourth marriages were far more common 
than second marriages are to-day. Never in civilized times 
has the theory been more consistently held that 

God made the woman for the use of man, 
And for the good and increase of the world. 

It was long after this that good Samuel Sewall, himself the 
husband of three women and the unsuccessful suitor of sev- 
eral more, wrote his tract in support of the theory that the 
weaker sex really have souls. When woman is neither hon- 
ored as a helpmeet nor worshipped as a mistress she is likely 
to inspire little poetry. 

The one subject for poetry that remained to the Puritan 
was the relation of God and man— a noble theme, but one on 
which men should write poems of Miltonic grandeur, or 
none. New England brought forth a Wigglesworth, not a 
Milton. 

The important writings that were produced in this early 

period were of two classes — ^historical and theological. The 

significant characteristics of these were two — 

W at was £j,gi common to them all, an intense moral 

Present ^ n i , 

earnestness; second, as almost the only mani- 
festation of the imagination, the use of a powerful and gro- 
tesque imagery — seen in the fondness for quotations from 
Revelation and the Prophets, and in the quaintly wrought 
phrases of Edward Johnson and others. The persistence of 
these two peculiarities and the introduction of some char- 
acteristics wanting in the early work will be seen in the lit- 
erature of the later period. 

III. The New England Colonies. Second Period^ 

1676-1765 

The first period of New England literature, in which 
writers were mostly born and educated in England, lasted 



The Colonial Time 57 

for about a half -century. The year 1676 is taken to mark its 

close, though any date between 1670 and 1680 would serve 

almost as well. The second period was nearly 

The Period of ^ century in duration, and extended to the 
Native Writers -^ ^ 

time when the colonists ceased to be truly 

colonial in spirit, and began the course of thinking and writ- 
ing that finally led to independence. During this second 
period the great majority of writers were born and educated 
in America. As has been seen, New England was not in close 
literary touch with the mother country. Such writings as 
were produced represent contemporary American conditions; 
and these had been little changed by outside influences since 
the great influx of immigrants between 1630 and 1640. It is 
not surprising, therefore, that the literary achievements of 
the time were not great. Though the amount of writing was 
large, as was to be expected in a community where education 
was so generally diffused and opportunities for printing were 
so numerous, yet the productions of real merit are relatively 
fewer than in the first half -century. As in the earlier period, 
historical, theological, and political writings were of the great- 
est importance ; but as the strictness of Puritanism began to 
relax there were slight attempts at other forms of composition. 
The historical writings of the second period were, like 
those of the first, many of them suggested by current events. 
From 1676 until the Eevolution was a period 

Historical ^f almost unbroken warfare with the Indians, 

Writings — 

Indian Wars either alone or allied with the French ; and 

the record of these terrible but somewhat 
monotonous conflicts has been preserved in many contempo- 
rary narratives. Few of these works were, however, history 
in the truest sense. Some were virtually political, others 
religious, tracts; and some were the personal accounts of 
participants. None of them was of great literary value, but 
a few may be named as types. 



58 American Literature 

A Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians in New 
England, From the first Planting thereof in the year 1607 

to the year 1677, by the Eeverend William 
HubbTd Hubbard (1621-1704), was written with a 

political purpose. The author was born in 
England, but came to America at an early age, and was 
a member of the first class graduated from Harvard. His 
history was published in 1677, and was clearly called forth 
by the outbreak of King Philip^s war two years earlier. His 
object appears to have been not only to gratify seasonable 
curiosity, but to defend the colonies in their relations to 
the Indians. As he tells the story, there is always but one 
side to the controversy; and he frequently pauses to notice 
charges made by ^^some persons^^ that the colonists had been 
unfair or brutal in their dealings with the natives. The 
value of this defense was appreciated by men prominent 
in the government, and the first edition was printed with 
a formal authorization by Simon Bradstreet, Daniel Denni- 
son, and Joseph Dudley. 

Increase Mather took advantage of the excitement over the 
Indian outbreak to point not a political but a religious moral. 

The purpose of his book, which also appeared 

ncrease -^ 1677, was shown by the title: Relation of 

Mather's History ^ -^ . ' 

the Troubles which have hapned in New 

England hy Reason of the Indians there. From the year 161-If- 
to the Year 1675, Wherein the frequent Conspiracies of the 
Indians to Cutt off the English, and the wonderfull provi- 
dence of God, in disappointing their devices is declared. 
Together with an historical discorse concerning the prev- 
alency of prayer. Showing that New England's late deliv- 
rance from the rage of the heathen is an eminent answer of 
prayer. The author^s chief thesis was that the recent troubles 
were a punishment inflicted by Providence on a generation 
that was becoming lax in religious faith. 



The Colonial Time 59 

A little later Entertaining Passages Relating to Philip's 

War was written by Major Benjamin Church (1639-1718), a 

participant, whose book was published in 

Benjamin ^^^q The author, who was a native of 

Church 

Plymouth, was one of the few writers of the 

time who were not ministers or graduates of Harvard. His 
account, which deals largely with the exploits of ^Taptain 
Church,^^ is very readable, though crude. In many ways it 
suggests the work of Captain John Smith a century 
earlier. 

Many of the writings called forth by the Indian troubles 
were not formal histories, but personal accounts of experi- 
ences, especially of captivity among the In- 
Narratives of dians. One of the most famous of these 
Rowlandson narratives is that of Mary Eowlandson, who 
in the winter of 1676 was carried off from 
Lancaster, Massachusetts, where her husband was pastor. 
Some time after her return she wrote an account of her 
adventures, which was published in 1682. It is a plain, 
pointed narrative, showing keen observation^ and revealing 
the personality of the author almost as plainly as the manners 
of the savages. 

Probably the most notable personal account growing out 
of the hostilities between 1702 and 1713 is The Redeemed 
T h wir Captive Returning to Zion, or A faithful 

history of RemarJcable Occurrences in the 
Captivity and Deliverance of Mr, John Williams, minister 
of the gospel of Deerfield, who in the desolation which hefel 
that plantation hy a incursion of the French and Indians, 
was hy them carried away, with his family and his neighbor- 
hood, into Canada, The occurrence referred to on this 
descriptive titlepage took place February 29, 1704. The 
author of the account was born at Eoxbury, Massachusetts, 
was graduated at Harvard, and except during the year of his 



60 American Literature 

captivity and a short time thereafter was, pastor of the 
church at Deerfield from 1688 until his death in 1739. 

The capture of the inhabitants of Deerfield was one of the 
most serious and horrible events of the long war. At first 
the author relates in detail the brutal murders of women and 
children who, on the march to Canada, became exhausted 
and a burden to their captors ; but after his wife had suffered 
this fate, and the number of victims increased, he writes 
more briefly. For example: ^^On Saturday (March 4) the 
journey was long and tedious; we travelled with such speed 
that four women were tired, and then slain by them who led 
them captive.^^ Through all these hardships the author sees a 
special providence of God in every escape, and a just affliction 
of God in every case of murder or torture. When he arrives 
at Quebec, his chief hostility seems to be directed, not against 
the Indians for their barbarity, but against the Jesuits, who, 
though according to his account they were humane, attempted 
to convert the captives to Eomanism. 

These narratives of captivity among the Indians had an 

especial importance in an age when all fiction was forbidden. 

Though they were usually written or at least 
Substitutes for i. j j? i. • • x j i j 

Fiction vouched lor by mmisters, and always avowed 

religious edification as their purpose, they 
abounded in thrilling adventures and hairbreadth escapes, 
and they were the New England boy's only equivalent for 
the Wild West stories that have charmed recent generations. 
In some of those of later date, though the truth of the story 
is always asserted and the moral purpose is always avowed, 
the facts are evidently colored for effect. In spirit, at least, a 
connection may be traced between these narratives and the 
nineteenth century romances in the manner of Cooper. 

Besides/the many histories and journals growing out of 
the Indian wars there were also produced a few general his- 
torical works. The most famous of these, Cotton Matber^s 



The Colonial Time 61 

Magnolia, or the Ecclesiastical History of New England, will 
be noticed in connection with other writings by the same 
author. Probably the most scholarly piece of 
General Histo- historical work done in New England during 
Pyjjj^jg the eighteenth century was Thomas Prince's 

Chronological History of New England in 
the form of Annals, Thomas Prince (1687-1758) was born 
at Sandwich, Massachusetts, and was graduated from Harvard 
in 1707. After two years spent probably in the study of 
theology he went to England, where he travelled, preached, 
and made a reputation that reached back to his colonial 
home. In 1717 he returned to Boston, and a year later 
became pastor of the Old South Church, which position he 
held until his death. His attention was early turned to his- 
torical studies, and soon after he became pastor he began to 
collect the famous library which he presented to his church, 
and which still bears his name. The duties of his pastorate 
left him little time for outside studies, however, and it was 
not until 1736 that the first volume of his history was pub- 
lished. This did not meet with the reception that it deserved, 
and it was not until 1754 and 1755 that three pamphlet parts 
of Volume II appeared. The last of these ends abruptly in 
the middle of a sentence describing the events of August 5, 
1633. It is probable that several more parts, perhaps all of 
the second volume, were completed, but public interest in 
the work did not encourage their publication, and no trace 
of them remains. 

As was usual with early historians. Prince felt it necessary 
to begin with the creation of the world, and more than half 
of his first volume is occupied in bringing the 
STmIS*^^" chronicle to 1620, when New England his- 
tory really begins. The preparation of this 
early chronology from the confused mass of historical 
fables that were then believed was a long and troublesome 



62 American Literature 

task for a man with Princess love of aceuracy, and he wasted 
upon it much time that he might profitably have expended 
upon the valuable manuscripts and records that he had col- 
lected. The real value of that part of the history that treats 
of New England comes from the exactness and scholarly care 
with which the author has verified every statement and tried 
to reconcile every apparent contradiction. In his preface he 
gives a long list of manuscript authorities to which he had 
access, many of which are now lost. These he cites con- 
tinually, not only referring to his authority, but wherever 
possible giving the exact words of the original. Like most 
historical works in strictly chronological form, Princess his- 
tory is dry and uninteresting to the general reader. To the 
student of history it is, however, of great value; and it is 
significant as showing how far the historical sense, first seen 
in Bradford and Winthrop, developed during the colonial 
time. When Princess opportunities are considered he may 
well be placed in the list with those later New Englanders 
who have won marked distinction for historical scholarship. 

Thomas Hutchinson (1711-1780), the last royal governor 

of Massachusetts, is best remembered for the part he took 

in the events leading to the Revolution, but 

omas j^jg relations as an historian are rather with 

the colonial than with the revolutionary epoch. 
He was born in Boston and was graduated at Harvard, and 
entered on a business and political career that lasted nearly 
half a century. He was inclined to the collection of histor- 
ical documents, as he tells us, by ^^the repeated destruction 
of ancient records and papers in the town of Boston.^^ His 
attention was turned mainly to the history of Massachusetts 
Bay, though in an appendix to his second volume he gives 
a summary of events in Plymouth. The first volume of his 
History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, which ap- 
peared in 1764, covered the period from the first settlement 



The Colonial Time 63 

of the colony until 1691. The second volume, published in 
1767, brought the narrative to 1750. Before this volume was 
given to the press the trouble between Massachusetts and the 
mother country had assumed a serious form. Hutchinson 
was inclined, both by temperament and by official position, 
to be a conservative, and he soon incurred the displeasure of 
the radical patriots. In August, 1765, his house was raided 
by a mob, and many of his manuscripts were lost or 
destroyed. That of the second volume of the History was 
rescued from the streets where it had been thrown. 

Hutchinson edited and published in 1769 A Collection of 
Original Papers relative to the History of the Colony of 
Massachusetts Bay. In 1774 he went to England, where he 
died in 1780. In these last years of his life he wrote a third 
volume of his History^ which remained in manuscript until 
1828. His treatment of the later years of the colonies, 
though as fair as could be expected, is colored by his views of 
the great controversies still unsettled at the time of his death. 
The earlier part, written before the seriousness of the coming 
struggle was recognized, is scholarly and judicial in tone. 

A few lesser historical writers are of some interest to the 
student of literature. William Hubbard, having made a 
beginning as an historian fai his narrative 
HiT^'ans ^^ *^^ Indian wars, wrote A General History 

of New England from the Discovery to 1680. 
This extended work, which remained in manuscript until 
1815, shows a considerable amount of research, but follows 
for the earlier years a few other authorities very closely. 
One of the most interesting chapters is that on ^^Memorable 
occurrences and sad accidents that happened in Kew England 
from 1666 to 1683" — an account that shows the feeling 
toward the marvellous that existed a few years before the 
witchcraft excitement. About the middle of the eighteenth 
century William Douglass (1691P-1752), a Scottish physi- 



64 American Literature 

cian, settled in Boston, published A Summary, Historical and 
Political^ of the First Planting, Progressive Improvements, 
and Present State of the British Settlements in North 
America. This discursive work in two volumes was quickly 
republished in London, and attracted much attention. It 
begins with ^^Some general account of ancient and modern 
colonies/^ and when it finally reaches America treats of the 
entire continent from Hudson^s Bay as far south as the 
English had planted settlements. In order to make his work 
more readable the author introduces digressions on all kinds 
of subjects from whaling to the small-pox. He is also free 
in the expression of his own opinions, particularly on matters 
in any way connected with his profession. His diagnosis of 
the witchcraft mania is especially interesting, as is the added 
remark : ^^The pourings out of the Spirit, which have at times 
been epidemick in Northampton upon the Connecticut river 
belong to this tribe of nervous disorders.^^ The book con- 
tains lists of salaries, details of public defenses, of manu- 
factures, etc., and other general information for which later 
historians should be thankful; but it is itself lacking in 
the system and proportion needful in a true history. 
Among the many histories of Indian troubles was that of 
Samuel Penhallow (1665-1726), which covered the wars of 
1703-13, and 1722-25. This is characterized by a display of 
extreme vindictiveness toward the Indians — a spirit the more 
noticeable because the author in his earlier years began a 
study of the native languages with the intention of serving 
as a missionary. Samuel Niles (1674-1762) left an incom- 
plete history of the Indian wars from 1634 to 1760. He was a 
clergyman, and frequently pauses in his narrative to draw a 
lesson. 

The journals and contemporary records of the second 
colonial period, though hardly as picturesque as those of the 
first, are of value to the later historian. The most important 



The Colonial Time 65 

diarist of the time was Samuel Sewall (1652-1730). Both 
the paternal and the maternal grandfathers of Judge Sewall 

were early immigrants to Massachusetts, but 
Journals and owing to some considerations of health his 
uefsewall^"^" parents went to England, where he was born 

in 1652. When he was about nine years of 
age the family returned to New England. Samuel Sewall was 
graduated at Harvard in 1671, and became a resident 
fellow, and afterward keeper of the college library. He 
studied divinity and began to preach, but abandoned the 
ministry for business and politics. For three years he was 
censor of the printing-press at Boston. In 1692 he became 
member of the council and judge of the probate court. As 
such he played a prominent part in the trials for witchcraft 
at Salem, but later became convinced of his error, and made 
a public statement of repentance — an act that cost him the 
friendship of the Mathers and other influential associates 
who refused to acknowledge that they had made a mistake. 
Besides the Diary he wrote The Selling of Joseph, usually 
spoken of as the first anti-slavery tract in America, and sev- 
eral other pamphlets on religious and political questions. 

Judge SewalFs Diary, the best authority extant on the 
details of colonial life and customs during the last of the 

«, T^. seventeenth and the first of the eighteenth 

SewalPs Diary ^ . , . .^^« . ., 

centuries, was begun m 1673, when the writer 

was a resident fellow at Harvard, and continued until 1729, 

one year before his death. In the earlier part we find the 

news of the day, trivial matters of personal interest, and 

details of the government of Harvard: 

Mar. 23. I had my hair cut by G. Barret. 

June 15. Thomas Sargeant was examined by the Corporation : 
finally, the advice of Mr. Danforth, Mr. Stoughton, Mr. Thatcher, 
Mr. Mather, (then present) was taken. This was his sentence. 

That being convicted of speaking blasphemous words concerning 



66 American Literature 

the H. G. he should be therefore publickly whipped before all the 
Scholars. 2. That he should be suspended as to taking his degree 
of Bachelour (this sentence read before him twice at the Prts. 
before the committee, and in the hall 1 up before execution). 3. Sit 
alone by himself in the Hall uncovered at meals, during the pleasure 
of the President and Fellows, and be in all things obedient, doing 
what exercise was appointed him by the President, or else be finally 
expelled the Colledge. The first was presently put in execution in 
the Library (Mr. Danforth, Jr. being present) before the Scholars. 
He kneeled down and the instrument Goodman Hely attended the 
President's word as to the performance of his part of the work. 
Prayer was had before and after by the President. 

In later years matters of personal concern occupy a large 
place, and we read with interest, though with a half-feeling 
of prying into another^s affairs, the record of the courtships 
which preceded his second and third marriages, and espe- 
cially of the unsuccessful wooing of Madam Katherine Win- 
throp. Mixed with the record of such matters are accounts 
of graver affairs of church and state. Wherever the reader 
opens the three heavy volumes of the Massachusetts Histor- 
ical Society Collections that contain this diary he is likely to 
find something of interest, and to learn something worth 
knowing regarding the manners of the time or the delightful 
personality of the author. 

A journal written in a much more self conscious tone than 
that of Sewall is Mrs. Sarah Kemble Knight's brief ac- 
count of her trip from Boston to New Haven 

Sarah Kemble ^^^^ ^^^ york in 1704. This is a shrewd 
Knight 

and minute description of the experiences of 

a traveller at that time, and lays chief stress on the incon- 
veniences of the road. It was not published until 1825. 

During almost the entire colonial time in New England a 

great part of the writings of all kinds was produced by the 

clergy. Though popular education was gen- 

th ^Minhters orally diffused, indeed almost universal, nearly 

every man who had the benefit of college 

training entered the ministry. This was owing partly to the 



The Colonial Time 67 

religious tone of the commonwealth, partly to the fact that 
the clergy assumed many of the duties that naturally belong 
to other professions. They took part, both as advocates and 
as arbiters, in the settlement of disputes; so that no need 
was found for the services of lawyers. There is no record 
of a professional barrister in Massachusetts before 1688, 
and long after that lawyers were few, and their calling was in 
rather ill repute. Medicine was gienerally on an unscientific 
basis, and many of the more reputable practitioners were 
clergymen who made the curing of bodies incidental to the 
saving of souls. Education, beyond the elementary instruc- 
tion supplied by dame schools, was also in the hands of the 
ministers. Even down to the nineteenth century it was 
customary for boys to prepare for college under the instruc- 
tion of some scholarly clergyman. 

It was natural that a body of men who had so nearly a 
monopoly of the intellectual callings should have almost a 
monopoly of authorship. The majority of the historians 
were clergymen. The same will be found true* of the writers 
of verse. Naturally, however, the great bulk of the writings 
which the members of the clerical profession published had 
to do with theology or the then closely related subjects of 
philosophy and statecraft. Works of this kind merit con- 
sideration by themselves. 

The closing years of the seventeenth and the first half of 

the eighteenth centuries saw a change in the relation of the 

ministers to the people that amounted almos!: 

The Clerical ^q ^ revolution. For the first two venerations 

Power . 

Threatened ^^ ^^^ England the power of the clergy was, 

as has been seen, practically absolute. The 

decline of this clerical power was brought about by a number 

of causes, economic, theological, and political. The material 

prosperity of the colonists had the effect of turning their 

minds to this world, rather than to the world to come; there 



68 American Literature 

was some truth in the continued complaints of the clergy that 
the people were less devout than their forefathers. The theo- 
logical position of the leading New England churches was 
attacked from various sides. Early in the eighteenth century 
there began to be felt a philosophical liberalism that resulted, 
long after, in the Unitarian schism. The emotional revivals 
of Whitefield, Edwards, and others about 1740 tended in 
another way to disturb the sedateness of the older church. 
More clearly recognized as a danger was the movement to 
introduce the established church of England — -a movement 
that found favor with the partizans of the royal governors. 

The political power of the clergy waned as the relations 
of the colonists to the mother country became more promi- 
nent. With the withdrawal of the charters in 1684-6 the 
old order of things was broken up; and when in 1691 
Increase Mather secured a new charter for Massachusetts it 
conferred suffrage not for church membership, but on the 
basis of a property qualification. From this time the churches 
as churches, and their pastors as their representatives, had 
less and less to say in matters of government. Ko one 
recognized this change more than the ministers themselves. 
Among the writings of the time none are of more interest 
than those which represent the fight in favor of the old time 
prerogatives — a fight which from the very constitution of 
the colonies was hopeless. 

Of all the influential ministers of New England during 
the last century of the colonial time, the three who stand 
out most prominently are Increase and Cotton Mather and 
Jonathan Edwards. 

The Mathers were for nearly fifty years the most conspic- 
uous supporters of the old church party. Increase, the son 

rrt. ^ X,. of Eichard Mather, who has been mentioned 

The Mathers . 

as one of the editors of the Bay Psalm Booh, 

was born at Dorchester, Massachusetts, in 1639, and died in 



• The Colonial Time , 69 

Boston in 1723. His son Cotton was born in 1663, and died 
in 1728. So much of the work of father and son was con- 
temporary that it will be convenient to treat of the two 
together. 

Increase Mather entered Harvard college at twelve years 
of age, but after a year his parents, fearing for his health, 
removed him and placed him under the tutor- 
ship of the Eeverend John Norton for some- 
thing over a year. He took his degree in 1656, at the age of 
seventeen, presenting as his graduating disputation an attack 
on the philosophy of Aristotle. About a year later he went 
abroad, took the Master^s degree at Trinity college, Dublin, 
spent some time in London, and preached in various parts 
of England and on the island of Guernsey. In 1661, driven 
out by the act of conformity, he returned to America. At 
first he preached alternately in his father's church at Dor- 
chester and in the N'orth Church at Boston. In March, 1662, 
he married his stepsister, the daughter of John Cotton, thus 
uniting two of the most distinguished clerical families of 
New England. In February, 1663, his son Cotton was born. 
The next year he was ordained pastor of the North Church, 
Boston. 

To write his biography for the next half -century would 
be to recount much of the history of 'the colony. For more 
than thirty years he was the leading spirit 
The Leading ^j Massachusetts in matters political, reli- 
Massachusetts gio^s, and educational; and even after the 
decline of his power, he and his son were 
leaders and spokesmen for a minority too strong and too 
active to be ignored. In 1679 he was moderator of the "Ee- 
forming Synod'' of New England churches, called to con- 
sider the evil ways of New England, which, in the opinion 
of the members, had brought upon the colonies the judg- 
ment of God in the shape of Indian wars and threatened 



70 American Literature 

political calamities. In 1681 he was tendered the presidency 
of Harvard^ but declined. Two years later he opposed sub- 
mission to the demand of Charles II that the charter be given 
up. In 1685 he accepted the presidency of Harvard. Early 
in 1688 he was sent to England with an address to the king. 
His mission was to secure the restoration of the old charter 
of Massachusetts; but failing in this before the Kevolution, 
and finding it impossible under William and Mary^ he devoted 
himself to securing a new charter on the most favorable terms 
possible. This course made Mather some enemies, especially 
as the officers under the new government were chosen by him. 
But for a time his party was in the ascendancy, and he was 
apparently the most powerful political force, as well as the 
most distinguished clergyman in New England. 

Meanwhile Cotton Mather had been graduated from Har- 
vard at the age of fifteen, had begun the study of medicine, 
abandoned this for the ministry, been called 

^^Zr v^^"^^ to assist his father, and had married the 
the Mathers 

daughter of Colonel Phillips. From this 
time on he and his father worked side by side. Signs of 
revolt against their dominion soon appeared. Later gov- 
ernors paid less and less attention to their counsels ; advocates 
of a more liberal theology established a rival church in 
Boston, and to their still greater annoyance secured control 
of Harvard college. Increase Mather, who had been presi- 
dent of the college while living in Boston and serving as 
pastor of his church, was legislated out of office by the adop- 
tion of a resolution that the president must reside at Cam- 
bridge. Later the presidency was conferred upon Leverett, 
the pastor of the Brattle street church, which had been 
organized in opposition to the Mathers; and on his death 
the corporation chose in succession three other ministers, 
passing by Cotton Mather, whose chagrin is frankly expressed 
in his diarv. 



The Colonial Time 71 

The champion of a losing cause is always unpopular. The 
unpopularity of the Mathers was greatly intensified by the 

part which they, or at least the younger, took 
T^e Mathers and ^^ ^j^^ persecutions at Salem for witchcraft. 

To what extent they were morally culpable 
for their part in this affair is a matter of dispute. Like most 
of their contemporaries in England and America they be- 
lieved in the possibility of witchcraft. They also believed 
that the loss of religious intensity and the tendency to 
disregard the leadership of the ministers were signs of appall- 
ing degeneration, and deserved divine punishment. The 
Lord had already sent Indian wars and political troubles 
without effect; it would not be strange if as a more terrible 
affiiction he allowed the Devil to work for a time unmolested 
in New England. Probably both men were sincere in the 
belief that this was the true analysis of the state of affairs, 
but they may have been the more ready to believe because 
the existence of this mysterious horror could be used as a 
telling argument in support of their position. Cotton 
Mather was especially active in the trials at Salem, and in 
the revulsion of feeling that followed, no one among the 
persecutors suffered more in reputation than he. Some years 
later he incurred the popular hatred for an action which is 
now approved even by those who dislike him most — his fear- 
less advocacy of inoculation for the smallpox. 

In character. Increase Mather seems to have been the saner 
and more practical of the two. Although he was a born 

autocrat, and a man of intense likes and dis- 

Cott^n^l/th ^^^^^' ^^ ^^^ something of a diplomat, who 
Compared knew how to meet men, and, while he kept 

control of his temper, how to use them for his 
purposes. Probably few men in the colony could have done 
better service in connection with the charter than he did.. 
In pure intellectual ability Cotton Mather was superior 



73 American Literature 

to his father. He was a wider reader, a more voluminous 
writer, possibly a more astute theologian. But certain weak- 
nesses of his character, intensified by his training, made him 
a less admirable, probably a less useful man. His position 
as the son of the leading New England divine, and his own 
precocity insured him a degree of admiration not conducive 
to modesty ; and unlike his father he never enjoyed the cor- 
rective influence of travel and contact with the great world. 
He well knew the extent of his intellectual acquirements, and 
in spite of constant expressions of humility it is impossible 
not to feel his pride. His temper was vindictive, and not 
always under control. He lived a life of the strictest Puritan 
asceticism, from the time when as a child he indulged in 
secret prayer and composed forms of prayer for his play- 
mates, to his old age when some of his fasts were of three 
days^ duration. His life cannot be understood without bear- 
ing in mind his constant fasts and vigils, his habit of intro- 
spection, and of seeing moral lessons in the most trivial acts of 
life. Such a man is not likely to have the broad Christian 
sympathy which draws others to him. Certainly Cotton 
Mather did not. In his old age he was forced to endure many 
disappointments. His aspirations for the presidency of 
Harvard college were thwarted. Many members of his church 
deserted him. The very boys of Boston taunted him with 
ribald songs. Within his own home he saw the death of two 
of his three wives ^nd thirteen of his fifteen children. His 
third wife became hopelessly insane. His oldest and dearest 
son became a wretched profligate. Yet there was something 
about his personality which prevents even these tragic expe- 
riences from arousing the sympathy that they might. 

In literary style father and son differed much as they dif- 
fered in temperament. Increase, while not free from ped- 
antry, usually wrote clearly and to the point. The works of 
Cotton show the extremes which the fantastic method reached 



The Colonial Time 73 

in New England. His writings abound in pedantic words, 
odd conceits, far-fetched allusions, and artificially constructed 
sentences. A fair idea of the difference in 
Dmerence m ^^^^q of the two men may be gained by com- 
paring the letters which they wrote to Governor 
Dudley in 1708. These letters, which express an indigna- 
tion that got the better of their good sense, might be 
expected to show the natural style of the authors. The open- 
ing of each will serve as an example. The first is from 
Increase : 

That I have had a singular respect for you, the Lord knows; but 
that since your arrival to the government, my charitable expecta- 
tions have been greatly disappointed, I may not deny. Without any 
further preface or compliments, I think it my duty freely and faith- 
fully to let you understand what my sad fears concerning you are. 

1st. I am afraid you cannot clear yourself from the guilt of 
bribery and unrighteousness : For you to declare to Mr. Newton, 
that he should not do what his office as judge in the admiralty obliged 
him unto, unless he would give you an hundred pounds, was surely 
a sin of that nature. And for you not to consent that some, whose 
titles to their land the general Assembly had confirmed, should enjoy 
their right, except they would give you a sum of money, is unright- 
eousness. 

Cotton Mather wrote as follows : 

There have appeared such things in your conduct, that a just con- 
cern for the welfare of your Excellency seems to render it necessary, 
that you should be faithfully advised of them. It was not without 
a design to introduce and exercise this faithfulness^ that I have in 
divers letters to your Excellency, sought out acceptable words ^ and 
acknowledged every thing in the world, that might at all dispose you 
to give me the hearing. In some of those letters, I have indeed, with 
the language of the tribe of Naphiali, insinuated unto you, what 
those points were, wherein I earnestly desired that we might ob- 
serve and confess you laudable. And I still imagined that you would 
at the same time understand my apprehension of there being points, 
wherein you were too defective. 

The amount of literary work put forth by these two men 
is enormous. Increase Mather is credited with almost one 
hundred and fifty published works. The list of Cotton 



74 American Literature 

Mather^s writings appended to his Life by his son Samuel 
includes three hundred and eighty-three titles, and this, later 
scholars tell us, is incomplete. 

Probably the most notable work of Increase Mather, from 
the stand-point of to-day, is his Essay for the Recording of 

Illustrious Providences, This book, pub- 
Increase lished in 1684, is a collection of marvellous 
Writings stories of divine intervention, some of which 

were contained in an earlier manuscript sent 
from England, and some contributed by New England clergy- 
men. Mather was rather the editor than the author. The 
stories are many of them well enough told to be readable to- 
day, and they derive some interest from their bearing on the 
witchcraft delusions of a decade later. The greater number 
of Increase Mather's publications are of course sermons. 
Eepresentative titles are ^^Important Truths about Conver- 
sion,'' ^^An Arrow against Profane and Promiscuous Dances,^' 
"The Eevolution Justified^' (1690), "The Voice of God in 
Stormy Winds.'' 

Of Cotton Mather's four hundred works the largest and 
best known is the Magnolia Christi Americana, or The 

Ecclesiastical History of New England, pub- 
Cotton Mather's lighed in London in 1702. This history 
Writings — the 
Magnalia covers the period from the earliest times to 

the close of the seventeenth century, and is 
divided into seven books. The first treats of the settlement 
and discovery of the country; the second gives the lives of 
the governors; the third the lives of sixty famous divines 
of the colonies; the fourth contains the history of Harvard 
college; the fifth treats of the ^%cts and monuments of the 
faith and order in the churches of New England"; the sixth 
is a record of illustrious providences; and the seventh, en- 
titled "The Wars of the Lord," tells of the afflictions and dis- 
turbances of the churches. This massive work, which Mather 



The Colonial Time 75 

himself considered his most important production, is a mine 
of not very reliable information for the student of our early 
history, and an excellent illustration of the way in which 
that history was viewed by an ultra-orthodox New England 
clergyman. Both style and plan show the author^s pedantry, 
and his fondness for anything but the natural manner of 
expression. Notwithstanding its defects, however, the Mag- 
nalia exerts a sort of fascination on the reader, particularly 
in the more direct passages, like the accounts of witchcraft 
and the Life of Sir William Phips. 

Another work of Cotton Mather^s, the memory of which 
has been preserved to us by the complimentary notice of 

Franklin in his Autoiiography, is Bonifacius, 
Cotton Mather's ^^ ^ ^^^ g,^^^ ^J^^^ -^ ^^- ^^ Devised 

Lesser vvritiiicfs 

and Designed, etc. — commonly known by the 

abbreviated title of Essays to do Good. This shows the prac- 
tical, common-sense side of the author^s mind. Still another 
book, the interest in which comes more from subject-matter 
than from method of treatment, is The Wonders of the Invis- 
ible World, in which the author gives his opinions upon 
witchcraft, and recounts with much detail some of the cir- 
cumstances that led him to believe in the presence of witches 
in New England.* Among representative titles of less- 
known and less important works are : Balsamum Vulnerarium 
e Scriptura: or the Cause and Cure of a Wounded Spirit; 
Brontologia Sacra: Sermons occasioned hy remarhdble 
Thunder-Storms; Pillars of Salt: An History of Criminals 
executed; with two Lectures on Sin punished with Sin; 



* An almost unique work of some interest to the student of history ia More 
Wonders of the Invisible World, published in London by Robert Calef , a hardheaded 
Boston merchant, in 1700. This reply to Cotton Mather's Wonders of the Invisible 
World contains a jumble of arguments against witchcraft, accounts of the recent 
manifestations at Salem as seen by an unbeliever, and attacks on the Mathers, 
especially Cotton. It probably owes part of its fame to the melodramatic fact 
that it was publicly burned in Harvard college yard by order of President In- 
crease Mather. 



76 American Literature 

Golgotha: A lively description of Death; with Memorials of 

an hopeful Young Man, 

After the death .of the Mathers the supporters of strict 

Puritanism in America found their cause steadily weakened 

both by active opposition and by popular 

The Great apathy. They were no longer able to pun- 

Awakening r J ^ J or 

ish trivial heresies and offenses against church 

discipline by the civil law; but they could still preach the 
certainty and the awfulness of a punishment hereafter. 
From this time there was an apparent increase in the number 
of sermons that pictured the tortures of the damned. One 
result of the striving after a livelier religious faith was a 
series of revivals known as the ^^Great Awakening/^ begin- 
ning about 1740. This movement, which was not confined to 
America, sprang from widely different sources; but it first 
manifested itself in New England as a consequence of stren- 
uous exertions on the part of those who still believed that 
without a return to the old spirit the colonies were hopelessly 
lost. The ultimate result of this revival was a schism in the 
church ; but at first it was welcomed by most of the orthodox 
as a special manifestation of Providence. 

The New Englander whose name is most prominently asso- 
ciated with this revival was Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), a 
man of the greatest piety, conscientiousness, 
eT^ d^ ^^^ delicacy of feeling. A glance at his por- 

trait is enough to show that he was made of 
finer stuff than most of his contemporaries. To such a mind 
the thought of eternal tortures, preached as his conscience 
told him he must preach it to an apathetic world, could only 
have been repulsive. He tells us that he was repelled by it ; 
and he seems to have become reconciled to the idea only 
through a course of metaphysical reasoning by which he 
proved to himself that it was both necessary and just. It 
was a strange result of the age that the man who had per- 



The Colonial Time 77 

haps the finest poetic sensibilities of any writer in colonial 
New England produced no poetry ;, but on the one hand the 
greatest American treatise on metaphysical theology, and 
on the other hand pictures of eternal torment the most 
graphic and detailed of the many that were painted during 
the reign of the old beliefs. 

Jonathan Edwards was born in East Windsor, Connecticut. 
He came of a family which had been in New England since 
1640, and his father was a graduate of Harvard, a minister 
noted for more than usual learning. In 1720 he was grad- 
uated at Yale college, which had come to be looked upon as 
the stronghold of orthodoxy, in opposition to Harvard, which 
had become hopelessly liberal. After receiving his first de- 
gree he remained at Yale for two years in preparation for 
the ministry, and after preaching to a Presbyterian congrega- 
tion in New York for eight months, he returned and was 
tutor for two or three years more. Early in 1727 he was 
settled as colleague with his grandfather, pastor of the church 
at Northampton. 

Jonathan Edwards is said to have been unusually preco- 
cious. As a boy he had an especial liking for natural science. 
It was in his early years, too, that he showed most plainly 
the poetic capabilities of his mind, which were afterward 
kept subordinate to his work as preacher and theologian. 
When fourteen years old he first read Locke ^^On the Human 
Understanding,^^ and some writings of this period show his 
grasp on metaphysics, even at this early age. Whether he 
knew Berkeley in the early part of his life is a matter of 
doubt. If not, he anticipated some of that philosopher's 
conclusions. 

In 1735 occurred the first of the revivals in Edwards's 
church at Northampton. His account of this, published in 
1736 and usually known as Narratives of Surprising Conver- 
sions, probably had much influence on similar occurrences 



78 American Literature 

elsewhere. About 1740 came the first visit of Whitefield, the 
great evangelist, to New England, and the ^^Great Awakening'^ 
already referred to. The history of this move- 
Edwards and ment cannot be given here. It presents a 
Revivals ^^^* ^^ psychological phenomena second only 

to the Salem witchcraft in peculiar inter- 
est, and the questions that it raised regarding the rights 
of itinerant ministers and the obedience due from congrega- 
tion to pastor were settled in a way that changed the ecclesi- 
astical history of New England. Edwards was made by 
temperament and by circumstances a champion of the move- 
ment, yet he seems always to have been conservative, and to 
have discountenanced both the excesses of the meetings and 
the claims of itinerants who disparaged the regular clergy. 

In 1750 Jonathan Edwards was dismissed from his pastor- 
ate at Northampton. It is impossible now to explain satis- 
factorily this action, which was then almost 
Edwards's Ihs- without precedent. Six years before he had 
Pastorate discovered that some of the young people of 

his congregation were reading books which 
tended "to promote lascivious and obscene discourse.^^ We 
could understand the matter better if we knew whether the 
books were such as would now be called obscene, or whether, 
as has been conjectured, they were eighteenth century novels 
which had found their way to Northampton. At all events 
the congregation failed to sustain the efforts of the pastor to 
discipline the offenders. From this time his power over his 
church declined. The immediate cause of the rupture seems 
to have been his views on admission to the Lord^s Supper, 
which were much" more strict than those of his grandfather. 
His farewell sermon is an admirable example of his contro- 
versial style and of the plain speaking allowed in the pulpit 
at that day. 
After his removal from Northampton Edwards settled at 



The Colonial Time 79 

Stockbridge as missionary to the Indians. Here he wrote his 
masterpiece, nsnally cited as the Treatise on the Freedom of 
the Will, in which he attempted to reconcile the conflict 
between the thought of m^n as a free moral agent and the 
thought of God as an omnipotent power. In 1757 he was 
called to the presidency of Princeton college, a position which 
he filled but a few weeks. He died of the smallpox in 1758. 

In addition to the two works already referred to, Jonathan 
Edwards published a large number of sermons and a few 
other treatises. His sermons are mostly long 
^war ss ^^^ elaborate, showing the painstaking work 

of the scholar. The great majority of them 
treat of doctrinal points or matters of church policy. These 
are admirably planned and written, and are dry only because 
the subjects are now uninteresting. The discourses that are 
best remembered are those that present the horrors of eternal 
punishment. Edwards is said to have had none of the tricks 
of the dramatic orator; but by the simplicity and force of 
his literary style, and his dignity and power as a man, he 
succeeded better than any other minister of his time in bring- 
ing his hearers to a realization of the awful doctrine that he 
preached. An account is preserved of the appalling effect 
produced at Enfield by his sermon on "Sinners in the 
Hands of an Angry God^^; and this sermon is perhaps the 
best known of all his published discourses. But many others 
are in the same strain. Among the titles are : "The Eternity 
of Hell Torments,^^ "The Justice of God in the Damnation 
of Sinners,^^ "Wicked men useful in their Destruction only,^^ 
"The Torments of the Wicked in Hell, no Occasion of Grief 
to the Saints in Heaven.^^ 

Mention has been made of the rapt and poetic tone of some 
of Edwards's early writings. His description of his future 
wife is a notable illustration. Less intense, but more typical, 
is a passage like the following : 



80 American Literature 

I very frequently used to retire into a solitary place, on the banks 
of Hudson's river, at some distance from the city, for contemplation 
on divine things and secret converse with God ; and had many sweet 
hours there. Sometimes Mr. Smith and I walked there together, to 
converse on the things of God ; and our conversation used to turn 
much on the advancement of Christ's kingdom in the world, and the 
glorious things that God would accomplish for his church in the latter 
days. I had then, and at other times, the greatest delight in the 
holy Scriptures, of any book whatsoever. Oftentimes in reading it, 
every word seemed to touch my heart. I felt a harmony between 
something in my heart and those sweet and powerful words. 

The same intensity of imagination^ turned in another 
direction, is seen in a passage like the following from the 
sermon on ^The Future Punishment of the Wicked Unavoid- 
able and Intolerable^^: 

We can conceive but little of the matter ; we cannot conceive what 
that sinking of the soul in such a case is. But to help your concep- 
tion, imagine yourself to be cast into a fiery oven, all of a glowing 
heat, or into the midst of a glowing brick-kiln, or of a great furnace, 
where your pain would be as much greater than that occasioned by 
accidentally touching a coal of fire, as the heat is greater. Imagine also 
that your body were to lie there for a quarter of an hour, full of fire, 
as full within and without as a bright coal of fire, all the while full 
of quick sense ; what horror would you feel at the entrance of such 
a furnace ! And how long would that quarter of an hour seem to 
you ! If it were to be measured by a glass, how long would the 
glass seem to be running ! And after you had endured it for one 
minute, how overbearing would it be to you to think that you had 
it to endure the other fourteen ! 

But what would be the effect on your soul, if you knew you must 
lie there enduring that torment to the full for twenty-four hours ! 
And how much greater would be the effect, if you knew you must 
endure it for a whole year ; and how vastly greater still, if you knew 
you must endure it for a thousand years ! O then, how would your 
heart sink, if you thought, if you knew, that you must bear it forever 
and ever ! That there would be no end ! That after millions of 
millions of ages, your torment would be no nearer to an end, than ever 
it was ; and that you never, never should be delivered. 

But your torment in hell will be immensely greater than this illus- 
tration represents. 

In conclusion, it may be said that everything that Jona- 
than Edwards wrote was characterized by care and order in 



The Colonial Time 81 

arrangement, purity and simplicity in diction. There is often 

a charm about his prose that attracts the reader, even when 

he presents a dry or repellent subject. His 

great work on The Freedom of the Will 

is a classic of metaphysics, not of literature; yet most of 

those who have tried to overthrow the argument have paid 

tribute to the logical care of the method and the charm of 

the style. 

The clergy of New England were as a body such scholarly 

men, the part they played in affairs was so great, that even 

those who lived with them found it difficult to measure their 

relative importance. So to-day it is hard to decide who 

should be raiiked next after Edwards and the Mathers. 

The few who will be mentioned here are among those who 

were most noted and whose fame seems to rest on the most 

enduring basis. Urian Oakes (1631P-1681) was a famous 

preacher of the last half of the seventeenth 
Minor Preachers , ^^^^ , , , , i t i i 

and Theologians century. When only a youth he published a 

series of astronomical calculations. Later in 
life he was considered a remarkable Latin scholar and an 
effective preacher of the old conservative school. His pub- 
lished works in prose are a few sermons that would hardly 
give him fame to-day. An elegy on Thomas Shepard has 
been mentioned elsewhere. John Wise (1652-1725) was 
among the first of the ministers who stood for the new demo- 
cratic order of things. He was born at Eoxbury, where his 
father had come as an indentured servant. In those days 
social position was everywhere taken into account; even at 
Harvard college students were listed in the catalogue and 
took their seats at table according to the rank of their fami- 
lies. The indignities to which Wise submitted on account of 
his humble birth may have had something to do with his sub- 
sequent leaning toward democracy. After he became a min- 
ister at Ipswich he led the opposition to the collection of taxes 



83 American Literature 

imposed by the royalist governrnent. For this he was 
arrested, fined, and imprisoned. The most important work of 
his later years was his reply to ^^Certain Proposals'^ put 
forth by the Boston Association of ministers in 1705. These 
proposals, for which the Mathers were doubtless responsible, 
advocated changes in the form of church government which 
would greatly increase the power of the clergy. This contro- 
versy was over ecclesiastical matters, but its significance 
may be seen from the fact that in the Eevolutionary time, 
half a century after Wise^s death, his Vindication of the 
Government of New England Churches was reprinted twice 
in a single year, and circulated as one of the best available 
expositions of the claims of democracy. 

Samuel Willard (1640-1707), long pastor of the Old South 
Church, Boston, and for some time acting head of Harvard 
college, was a typical theologian of the old school. He pub- 
lished in 1726 A Compleat Body of Divinity, in Two Hun- 
dred and Fifty Lectures on the Assembly's Shorter Cate- 
chism, and many other sermons. A famous minister of a 
somewhat later time was John Barnard (1681-1770), a 
native of Boston, a graduate of Harvard in the class of 1700. 
Barnard went to England for a time, where he was offered 
an official chaplaincy, but declined because he would not 
assent to the thirty-nine articles. In spite of this his asso- 
ciation with churchmen and royalists brought him into some 
disrepute, and on his return to America he had difficulty in 
finding a pulpit. He was finally accepted by the church at 
Marblehead; but he was always somewhat unorthodox, and 
is sometimes said to have been the first New England min- 
ister to deviate from Calvinism. He published many ser- 
mons, some miscellaneous work, and a version of the Psalms. 
Charles Chauncy (1705-1787), pastor of the Eirst Church of 
Boston for sixty years from 1727 to 1787, has a place in the 
political as well as the theological history of America, A 



The Colonial Time 83 

grandson of President Charles Channcy of Harvard, he in- 
herited some of the love of controversy that often distin- 
guished Harvard divines. Of his sixty printed sermons a 
large part attack somebody or something. What he disliked 
he hated heartily. His aversion to poetry was such that he 
wanted ^Taradise Lost'^ translated into prose. The preach- 
ing of Whitefield was especially distasteful to him, and he 
led the opposition to sensationalism in the pulpit. In the 
contest between England and the colonies he was a staunch 
patriot, and he expressed his views frankly in print. 

The best example of the new and radical type of minister 
who was possible by the middle of the eighteenth century was 

Jonathan Mayhew (1720-1766). He was a 
u\ ^^ graduate of Harvard, and was pastor of the 

West Church in Boston from 1747 until his 
death. His present fame seems to rest on his heterodoxy 
and his patriotism, neither of them perhaps his most 
worthy characteristic. Even before his ordination he 
had expressed his disbelief in some of the fundamental 
doctrines of Calvinism, and during his pastorate he was 
denied the full fellowship of the Congregational min- 
isters of Boston. Among other heresies he refused to ac- 
cept the dogma of the Trinity, and it has been said that 
his church was the first in Boston to declare itself Unitarian. 
His habit of independent thinking was carried into political 
matters. In a sermon preached on the anniversary of the 
execution of King Charles I, and on other occasions, he 
expressed the view of government and political rights after- 
ward advocated by his close friends, James Otis and Samuel 
Adams. These sermons on political subjects, and several 
others directed against the (Episcopalian) Society for the 
Propagation of the Gospel have an element of sensationalism. 
The preacher is not only frankly outspoken, but he shows 
a fondness for striking, even startling turns of phrase. His 



84 American Literature 

sermons on other subjects are many of them free from this 
peculiarity, and have a freshness, a modern quality of style 
that makes them almost readable to-day. 

In the departments of knowledge already considered — 
history and religion — the second period in New England pro- 
duced writings that were, all things consid- 
Little Pure Lit- g^ed, very creditable. In what is sometimes 
England called pure literature little was done, and 

that little was of small merit. In England 
the period under consideration saw the development of the 
periodical essay and of the novel. In America neither of 
these forms of writing was attempted. Novels were not 
only not written but it was forbidden to read them; and 
the Puritan boy was forced to content himself with stories 
of Indian adventure authenticated by the Eeverend John 
Williams and other clerical captives. The Addisonian essay 
was echoed, if at all, in the brief comments and bits of 
moralizing to be found in the almanacs. JSTathaniel Ames 
(1708-1764), of Dedham, Massachusetts, was for many 
years the editor of one of the more famous almanacs pub- 
lished in New England. His wise and witty sayings were 
evidently imitated, if not stolen, from English almanac- 
makers. The best of them do not equal the work of Poor 
Eichard in Philadelphia. 

In verse the later colonial period was almost as barren as 

in polite prose. The attention paid in England to poetic 

form could not be without some influence in 
Verse 

America; and New England dabblers in verse 

gradually came to realize that there were such things as 
rhythm and metre, and that they were of some importance. 
But there was no imagination corresponding to the improve- 
ment in form, and perhaps no one in the period was so well 
deserving the name of poet as was Anne Bradstreet or 
Michael Wiggles worth. 



The Colonial Time 85 

In the latter part of the seventeenth century verse was 

largely elegiac^ if this term can be applied to the effusions 

inspired by the deaths of various persons. 

^ ^ These memorial poems were mostly by min- 

isters; and the best of them were by men who did little in 
verse. Among them are the ^^Elegy^^ upon the death of the 
Eeverend Thomas Shepard, by Urian Oakes^ and a ^^Dirge 
for the Tenth Muse^^ (Anne Bradstreet) by John Norton^ 
pastor at Higham, Massachusetts. These seem to be the only 
surviving poetical work of their respective authors. Both 
show fair skill in versification^ though with halting passages ; 
both are pitched in the high artificial key of exaggerated 
lament so common in the seventeenth century^ though they 
are without the conceits and quirks noticed in the memorial 
verses of the earlier period. The fashion of these conceits was 
preserved, however, in the work of Nicholas Noyes (1647- 
1717), long pastor at Salem. He was somewhat prolific of 
obituary and occasional poetry, and his love of puns and far- 
fetched turns of phrase was not exceeded by any of his prede- 
cessors. 

Later in the period American versifiers, like their English 

contemporaries, yielded implicitly to the heroic couplet, and 

some of them acquired fair facility in its 

Heroic Couplet ^^^' "^^^ Eeverend John Adams, born in 
Nova Scotia in 1704, graduated at Harvard 
in 1721, and died at Newport, Ehode Island, in 1740, wrote 
poems in the conventional manner, which gave promise of 
better things. A few lines will give an impression of all : 

Happy the man, who, in a calm of soul, 
Can aU his warring passions' waves control ; — 
Who stands unmoved, and hears the rustling wind 
Of malice strive to shake his steadfast mind ; 
From whose clear breast full satisfaction boils. 
While in his cheeks rejoice the cheerful smiles. 
In vain would Envy with her harpy claws 
His peace destroy, or prey upon his joys. 



86 American Literature 

Some of the serious verse of Mather Byles (1707-1788), 
who boasted a correspondence with Pope, is in the same man- 
ner. Anonymous examples may also be found in a con- 
gratulatory volume sent by Harvard college to King George 
III in 1761. 

Besides the serious attempts, some beginnings of humorous 
verse appeared early in the eighteenth century. John Sec- 
comb (1708-1792), a divinity student at 
Humorous Harvard, wrote some jingly verses which 

Seccomb purported to be the last will of one Matthew 

Abdy, a bed-maker and handy man about the 
college. The opening stanzas run: 

To my dear wife 

My joy and life, 
I freely now do give her 

My whole estate, 

With all my plate. 
Being just about to leave her. 

A tub of soap, 

A long cart rope, 
A frying pan & kettle, 

An ashen pail 

A threshing flail. 
An iron wedge and beetle. 

This doggerel was sent to England and appeared simultane- 
ously in the ^^London Magazine'^ and the ^^Gentleman's 
Magazine'^ for May, 1732. Later it was reprinted in Amer- 
ica with the title ''Father Abbey's Will.'' To the reader of 
to-day it seems cheap, pointless, and vulgar. Why it was 
given recognition by the two leading literary magazines of 
England is hard to say. It must be remembered, however, 
• that standards of humor were different in the eighteenth 
century. Even Goldsmith's ''Elegy on a Mad Dog" does 
not now arouse the hilarity that it once did. "Father Abbey's 
Will" was followed by another poem in the same metre pur- 



The Colonial Time 87 

porting to be a proposal of marriage to his widow from the 
sweeper of Yale college. 

A humorist of greater literary merit was Mather Byles, a 
descendant of Eichard Mather and John Cotton, a Harvard 

graduate, and pastor of the HoUis street 
^ church in Boston from 1733 to the Eevolu- 

tion, when he was driven from his pulpit on account of his 
loyalist sympathies. His fame suffered somewhat from the 
fact that he took the unpopular side in the great struggle; 
but in the earlier years of his ministry he was known as a 
sound and eloquent pulpit orator, and in private life as a 
genial, witty gentleman. Many of his puns and jokes have 
come down to us in tradition. He wrote some serious verse, 
for example, ^^To his Excellency, Governor Belcher on the 
Death of his Lady, an Epistle,^^ and ^^On the Death of the 
Queen, a Poem,^^ and some hymns. His humorous verses 
include burlesque ballads and parodies. 

Among the lesser versifiers of the eighteenth century 
should perhaps be remembered Mather Byles^s friend, Joseph 

Green (1706-1780). The intimacy between 
Hixmorist ^^^ scholarly Tory clergyman and this wealthy 

Whig distiller must have arisen partly from 
the attraction of opposites, but they were fellow-graduates of 
Harvard and fellow-writers of humorous poetry. Greenes 
verse was more satirical than that of his friend, and his 
humor was somewhat broader. He wrote a parody on 
Byles's fine ^^Hymn Written during a Voyage,^^ and this was 
in turn parodied by Byles. 

Besides the verses written by the ministers and men of 
culture there were crude attempts of the people — songs of 

the French and Indian wars, and ballads 

whose only merit was their rudeness and di- 
rectness. Of these one is remembered, perhaps, more because 
its author, Peter Folger, was the grandfather of Benjamin 



88 American Literature 

Franklin than for any merit of its own. Polger was an 
Englishman who came to America with his father in 1635, 
and settled first at Martha^s Vineyard and afterward at 
Nantucket. His poem A Looking Glass for the Times, or 
The former Spirit of New-England revived in this genera^ 
tion, was a plea for toleration, or rather an attack on those 
who were intolerant. Its occasion was the wars and afflic- 
tions that the colonists were experiencing about 1675. Like 
the members of the clerical party, he believed that these were 
a punishment from God, but he believed that they were 
inflicted, not because of laxity in faith, but because of nar- 
rowness and illiberality. A few lines will serve as a sample : 

I would not have you for to think, 

tho' I have wrote so much, 
That I hereby do throw a Stone 

at Magistrates as such. 
The Rulers of the Country I 

do own them in the Lord ; 
And such as are for Government, 

with them I do accord. 
But that which I intend hereby, 

is that they would keep bound, 
And meddle not with God's Worship, 

for which they have no ground. 

This ballad was written in 1675, and Franklin has been 
quoted as authority for the assertion that it was published in 
that year; but it is not clear that he intends to make this 
statement, and there is no other evidence of a printed edi- 
tion until 1763. If the author discreetly kept his poem in 
manuscript, he hardly deserves all the praise that he has 
received for courage in speaking his mind. 

Peter Folger, who comes just at the point of division be- 
tween the first and the second periods, is of interest because 
ho reveals a side of New England life but little seen anywhere 
in colonial literature. The writings that have been enumer- 
ated in the foregoing pages were produced mostly by the clergy. 



The Colonial Time 89 

They represent the spiritual aspirations, the theological ques- 
tionings, the wild rhapsodical imaginings of the Puritans. 

But there existed among the inhabitants of 
^New^EnTan^^ -^^^ England a tendency to be practical, to 

.apply hard common sense to the everyday 
affairs of life in a very shrewd matter-of-fact way. The 
colonists amassed wealth. They drove hard bargains 
with the Indians, with their neighbors, even with one an- 
other. All this side of their character found little expres- 
sion in literature. Printing, and even writing, were still 
serious matters, and only worthy thoughts were preserved on 
paper. Men who possessed both the devout and the worldly 
practical natures took pains to show only the former in their 
writings; and those who lived on the lower plane — the busi- 
ness men, the tradesmen, the artisans — hardly wrote at all. 
The student finds indications of this hard New England 
common sense in the implied objections answered by writers 
on theology and politics, in the treatment of witchcraft by 
men like Eobert Calef, in the more personal parts of SewalPs 
Diary, in anecdotes of the Franklin family as told in Benja- 
min^s Autobiography, and in comments by visitors from the 
old world and from other colonies. Notwithstanding the 
fact that it makes so slight a figure in colonial writings, it 
had great influence on New England literature of a later 
date. 

In conclusion, it may be said that the writings of the 
later colonial time in New England were characterized by 

intellectual power, but by esthetic barrenness. 
Limitations of jjy^j^ ^j^jg praise needs some modification; 

Literature ^^^ ^^^ same tendencies that prevented grace- 

ful expression led also to a narrowness, a lack 
of that sane and healthful view of things that is essential 
to the highest intellectual activity. The ablest and most 
learned men of the time showed pedantry rather than scholai"- 



90 American Literature 

ship, ingenuity rather than analytic insight. Even Jonathan 
Edwards, the greatest of them all, is not wholly an excep- 
tion to this statement. Their lack of a true literary sense 
was in part due directly to defects in the Puritan character, 
and more largely to the fact that the Puritans denied them- 
selves the examples of the greater English masters. While 
the Virginian was following every whim of literary fashion, 
the Massachusetts writer continued almost in the manner of 
1620, unmoved by even the strongest literary tendencies. 
Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards were early and late 
contemporaries of William Byrd, yet his work seems far 
more modern than that of either. The result of all this was 
that the latest of the Puritans gave to their descendants the 
example of mental industry, learning, and intense moral 
earnestness, but they left them with no sense of literary 
form, and indeed with no adequate appreciation of its value. 
This one-sided heritage must be kept in mind in studying 
the later development of literature in New England. 

IV. The Middle Colonies 

The middle colonies were founded somewhat later than 

Massachusetts. Most of them made less careful provision 

^, ., , , , . for education : but they had an advantage 

Philadelphia . + • • 4.4.1 4* i. ;i • 

m contammg many settlers of broader views 

and more catholic taste. Next after Boston the city which 
achieved greatest literary prominence during the first two- 
thirds of the eighteenth century was Philadelphia. It is 
worthy of note that the most distinguished author of Phila- 
delphia was a man who received his early training in Boston, 
but who represented the practical side of the New England 
character, and who fortunately escaped to the freer atmos- 
phere of the Quaker city. 

Benjamin Franklin's long life of eighty-four years (1706- 
1790) spanned the period of the Eevolution, and saw the 



The Colonial Time 91 

establishment of the national government. The political 
services for which he is best remembered were performed in 

the later period, and it was toward the close 
Fran^n^ of his life that he wrote the Autohiographij, 

from a literary standpoint his most im- 
portant work. But the man himself was a product of the colo- 
nial time, and as the man and his writings are so closely con- 
nected it seems best to consider him among colonial writers. 
Franklin was born in Boston in 1706. Peter Folger, his 
grandfather on the maternal side, has already been men- 
tioned. On his father^s side he was descended from a line 
of thrifty artisans, many members of the family having been 
blacksmiths. His father was trained as a dyer, but on 
removing to New England he found this trade in little 
demand and became :a maker of soap and candles. Benja- 
min was the fifteenth in a family of seventeen children. 
He was first intended for the ministry, but the family in- 
come was too small to admit of giving him a college educa- 
tion, and after a brief schooling, he was set to work in his 
father's shop. At this he rebelled, and wanted to go to 
sea. At length, when he was twelve years of age, his father, 
noticing his fondness for reading, apprenticed him to his 
brother James, who was a printer. Even before this time 
he had read through his father's library, which ^^consisted 
chiefly of books in polemic divinity,'' and had saved his 
pennies to buy Bunyan's works, which he sold again to 
procure Burton's Historical Collections. The same devotion 
to reading was continued throughout his apprenticeship. He 
boarded himself, and subsisted on a vegetable diet, expend- 
ing for books what he could save from his allowance for food. 
An odd volume of the Spectator fell into his hands, and on 
this he deliberately modeled his prose style. 

His first attempt at writing was not, however, in prose 
but in verse. Early in his apprenticeship he composed two 



92 American Literature 

ballads, one on the drowning of a light-house keeper and his 
two daughters, the other on the capture of Blackbeard, a 
pirate who had long infested the New Eng- 
E 1 w Y l^^d coast. These were printed by James 

Franklin and peddled about the streets by the 
author. They were very successful, but the boy was dis- 
suaded by his father from further attempts at verse-making. 
His next literary venture was when he was sixteen years of 
age. By this time his brother had founded the ^^New Eng- 
land Courant/^ and for this Benjamin wrote the ^^Dogood 
Papers/^ on the Addisonian model. Fearing that his brother 
would ignore anything coming from him, he at first dis- 
guised his hand and slipped the manuscript under the office 
door. After several numbers had been printed and warmly 
praised he revealed himself as the author. 

Franklin thus entered the world of letters at a time when 
Samuel Sewall was writing his diary and Increase and Cot- 
ton Mather were laboring for the continu- 
Franklin's ^^^^^ ^f ^j^^ ^^j^ ecclesiastical order in New 

Yankee 
Characteristics England. As has been said, however, he rep- 
resented a class far different from that to 
which these worthies belonged. In the Franklin family, as 
we catch glimpses of it in the Autohiography, we see the 
characteristics, good and bad, which have since been asso- 
ciated with the word "Yankee.'^ On the one hand were 
industry, economy, shrewdness, and a determination to keep 
within the letter of the law; on the other hand was a dis- 
position to believe that these virtues constituted the whole 
duty of man. The greatest test was always ^^Does it pay?'^ 
One reason that led the elder Franklin to give up the idea 
of educating Benjamin for the ministry was ^^the little 
encouragement that line of life afforded.^^ Later he dis- 
suaded him from writing ballads by telling him that ^^verse- 
makers were generally beggars.^^ 



The Colonial Time 93 

Another example of shrewdness, carried beyond the limit 
of strict ethics, is seen in James Franklin^s management of 
the ^^New England Courant/^ As editor he seems to have 
discovered that sensationalism may be financially profitable 
to a newspaper; and his constant aim was apparently to see 
how far he could go without incurring punishment from 
the strait-laced rulers of Boston. At last he over-stepped the 
line, was arrested, imprisoned, and forbidden to issue the 
paper longer. Instead of discontinuing its publication he 
adopted the subterfuge of printing it in Benjamin's name. 
Accordingly the articles of apprenticeship were publicly can- 
celled, and a secret agreement was drawn in their stead. 
Benjamin was quick to see that these secret articles were not 
binding on him, since James would not dare to make them 
public. He therefore snapped his fingers in his brother's 
face and ran away to Philadelphia. 

The details of his trip, and his first adventures in the 
Quaker city, are told in one of the most familiar parts of 

the Autoiiography, He secured employment 
PhUadebhia ^^^^ Samuel Keimer, an erratic printer who 

was something of a figure in the early life of 
Philadelphia. Soon he attracted the attention of Governor 
Keith, who offered him patronage and sent him to England 
to buy types and a press for a printing office of his own. 
Arrived there, he found that he had been duped, and that 
Keith had given him neither the introductions nor the credit 
that he had promised. He remained in London for eighteen 
months, working in different printing-offices, reading much, 
meeting some persons of note, and writing a free-thinking 
pamphlet, '^A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleas- 
ure and Pain.'' When he returned to Philadelphia he served 
as bookkeeper and general assistant to a merchant; but in 
a few months his employer died and he again became a 
printer, first in the employ of Keimer, then in an office of 



94 American Literature 

his own. By his industry and the shrewd tricks that he knew 
so well how to plan he succeeded, and soon became a promi- 
nent citizen. He was instrumental in founding the public 
library; he organized the first fire company in Philadelphia, 
headed the movement for a better police system, and was 
concerned with many other municipal improvements. 

The events of Franklin^s early life have been given in 

some detail because they are so valuable in showing the 

forces that went to the forming of the man, 

Career ^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ ^^ illustrating the class of New 
England citizens to which he belonged. His 
later years must, in spite of their importance to the student 
of history, be passed over more hurriedly. By 1748 he had 
prospered so well that he sold his printing-office for a com- 
fortable sum, and proposed to devote himself to the study 
of science, for which he had developed a fondness. His 
best-known experiments are those with electricity, but he 
made excursions into various fields, and communicated the 
results of his researches to scientific men in Europe and 
America. He had already dabbled in politics, and in 1752 
he was elected to the colonial assembly, and was later made 
postmaster-general. From 1757 to 1761 he was in London as 
agent of the colonial assembly. In 1764 he was again sent 
to London on a political mission and remained until 1775, 
taking a prominent part in all the agitation that preceded 
the Eevolution. Shortly after his return to America he was 
sent to France to negotiate for aid in the struggle for inde- 
pendence. He remained in Paris, an idol of the French 
people, until 1785, serving his country in various ways, 
finally as member of the peace commission. After his return 
to Philadelphia, though over eighty years of age, he was still 
active in public affairs. His last work of importance was 
as member of the Constitutional Convention. 

Franklin^s published works, which in the standard editions 



The Colonial Time 95 

fill ten heavy volumes, cover a multitude of subjects — the- 
ology, science, politics, morals, even literary criticism. His 
fame as a man of letters rests, however, on 
ings— Poor ^^^^^ works: the 'Toor Eichard'^ sayings, the 

Richard's Autobiography, and the ^^Bagatelles/^ It was 

Almanac ^^ ^^^2, not long after he had established 

himself in business on his own account, that he began the 
publication of ^Toor Eichard^s Almanac/^ In putting forth 
this work he adopted the name of Eichard Saunders, an 
English almanac-maker of note, but he gave the assumed 
author the character of a poor but thrifty American. The 
hint of Poor Eichard probably came from the characters in 
the Spectator, but it is perhaps because he is so much like 
Franklin himself that he and his wife Bridget ^^are quite as 
real as any characters in the whole domain of fiction.^^ 
These almanacs were introduced by prefaces that tried to 
be both witty and instructive. They contained the usual 
calendars and astronomical data, predictions concerning the 
weather, suggestions in regard to crops, and scattered here^ 
and there wise saws and pointed sayings. It is these last 
that have made Poor Eichard famous. 

The ethical code of the almanac-maker did not require that 
these sayings be original, and many that bear Pranklin^s 
name were not his own. It is now impossible to say which 
he originated, which he borrowed entire, and which he 
adapted to suit the occasion. The majority probably belong 
to the last-named class. But he deserves the credit of mak- 
ing them all pass current. After Poor Eichard had become 
widely known he combined the best of his sayings in an 
address purporting to have been delivered at an auction by 
an old man known as Father Abraham. It was in this dis- 
course, sometimes called ^The Way to Wealth,^^ that a later 
generation usually read Poor Eichard^s advice. A para- 
graph will serve as an illustration : 



96 American Literature 

// time he of all Things the most precious, wasting Time must he, 
as Poor Richard says, the greatest Prodigality ; since, as he elsewhere 
tells us, Lost Time is never found again; and what we call Time 
enough, always proves little enough: Let us then up and be doing, 
and doing to the Purpose ; so by Diligence shall we do more with less 
Perplexity. Sloth makes all Things diMcult, hut Industry all easy, 
as Poor Richard says ; and He that riseth late must trot all Day, and 
shall scarce overtake his Business at Night; while Laziness travels 
so slowly, that Poverty soon overtakes him, as we read in Poor 
Richard, who adds. Drive thy Business, let not that drive thee; and 
Early to Bed and early to rise, makes a Man healthy, wealthy, and 
wise. 

The influence of the Poor Eichard sayings is hardly to 
be overestimated. They were published in the most popular 
almanac of the colonial time ; and publication in an almanac 
was the surest way to secure wide circulation. No family was 
so poor as to be without one of these necessary pamphlets; 
and often it was the only secular reading matter that the 
house contained. During the year that it was current its 
contents were read so often that they were committed to 
memory by young and old. The best of the proverbs were 
also circulated in the ^^Address of Father Abraham/' and 
in various other forms. It is safe to say that for a hundred 
years no phrases except those of Scripture were so familiar 
to Americans everywhere as those of Poor Eichard; and 
many of them gained equal currency abroad. Even to-day, 
when the habit of quoting wise saws has almost fallen into 
disuse, they are by no means forgotten. 

The Autobiography was begun in 1771, while Franklin 
was in England, but was soon laid aside. At the urgent 
request of friends it was taken up from time 
Au^obiographv *^ ^™^ until 1788, when the last installment 
was written. It traces the author's life only 
to 1757, but it covers the years that are most interesting to 
the student of Franklin the man. The qualities which have 
made the Autobiography one of the few American classics 



The Colonial Time 97 

are its simplicity of style and the frankness and openness 
with which the author reveals his personality. Few books 
can charm readers of all ages and all temperaments; Frank- 
lin's Autobiography comes very near doing this. It is the 
first book written in America which an American to-day 
need hesitate to say he has not read. 

The ^^Bagatelles'' were short sketches written while Frank- 
lin was in France to please a circle of his intimate friends. 

, ^ „ The best were composed for Madame Bril- 
Tlic H&fifRtcllcs 

lion, a French woman whose society he espe- 
cially enjoyed. Among them are the ^^Story of the Whistle/' 
and the "Dialogue between Franklin and the Gout/' once 
in every school reader, but now less familiar. These embody 
the author's philosophy of life, but, owing perhaps to French 
influence, they have not quite the naturalness and genuine- 
ness of the Poor Eichard sayings and the Autobiography. 

Franklin as statesman and Franklin as scientist cannot 
be considered here; yet it must be remembered that he 

was more important, to the minds of con- 
of^Letters^^ ^^ temporaries at least, in these roles than in 

that of literary man. Indeed, in the strict 
sense of the word he can hardly be called a man of letters. 
His own prose style is excellent, and he appreciated work of 
the same simple, straightforward sort; but he does not seem 
really to have possessed much taste in regard to other forms 
of literature. He enjoyed dabbling in literary criticism, but 
his judgments are likely to be commonplace or amusingly 
erroneous. He does not seem even to have appreciated the 
majestic prose of the Bible. He gravely wrote an emenda- 
tion of the Lord's Prayer, with reasons for each change ; and 
later, when in France, he produced a modernized version of 
the first part of Job. Probably this last bit of composition 
is not to be taken seriously. If not, it at least shows that he 
was willing to parody the work of the Hebrew poet. His 



98 American- Literature 

own verse compositions, with the exception of a drinking 
song of doubtful authenticity, are worthless. 

Franklin is sometimes spoken of as a great moral teacher. 
Such praise only calls attention to his weakness. An exami- 
nation of his writings will show that he 
T^^h r^ ^^ ^ taught only the prudential virtues — how to 
be healthy, wealthj^, and wise, rather than 
how to be good, except as a matter of policy. His own morals 
in early life were very loose. His only son who survived 
infancy was an illegitimate child; and he was engaged in 
intrigues with women in London and in Philadelphia until 
the time of his marriage. In his Autobiography he speaks of 
these affairs with regret, but his reason is that they "were 
attended with some expense and great inconvenience, be- 
sides a continual risk to my health.^^ Even in his later years 
he produced writings so obscene that no editor has ventured 
to print them. His moral weaknesses, and the fact that he 
adopted worldly prosperity as the test of success in life, have 
led to some adverse criticism of Franklin as a man, among 
which is a remark attributed to Jefferson Davis that he was 
"the incarnation of the peddling, tuppenny Yankee.^^ In 
response to this it is sufficient to say that, many-sided as 
his character was, we cannot expect to find it universal. He 
had personal faults and his precepts do not constitute a 
complete rule of conduct, but none of them teach immorality, 
and most of them have, directly or indirectly, a moral ten- 
dency. He made Poor Eichard say, "It is hard for an empty 
sack to stand upright,^^ and he always maintained that the 
most practical way to make men virtuous was to remove 
temptation by making them thrifty, prosperous, and con- 
tented. 

Franklin should be remembered for his connection with 
both the New England and the Middle colonies. As has 
been seen, he represents one side, and only one side, of the 



The Colonial Time - 99 

New England character. He was wholly without religious 
mysticism or fine idealism, but he was in every way typical 
of the shrewd, practical, hard-headed Yankee. 
p^^?. ^ And in Pennsylvania he had an opportunity 

to develop his bent as he never could have 
done under the eye of the Puritan ministers and magistrates. 
It may or may not be reasonable and fortunate that he is 
often cited as the embodiment of the true American spirit; 
but he was a power in his own and succeeding generations, 
and he still remains the best known American writer of the 
colonial time. 

In population Pennsylvania was the most heterogeneous 
of the colonies, the settlers comprising Germans, Moravians, 
Welsh, Scotch-Irish, and Swedes. Some of 
Intellectual Con- ^i^q^q people cared little for learning, and in 
Pennsylvania many outlying districts nothing was done 
for education. In Philadelphia and other 
communities where the Quakers were numerous schools were 
early established, and were second in number and quality 
only to those of ISTew England. A printing press was set 
up, and as the colony allowed freedom in the expression of 
belief, works of many kinds were published unmolested. The 
first magazine in America was issued in Philadelphia; and 
the first public library really deserving the name was started 
there. There was no college until 1755, but when the Uni- 
versity of Pennsylvania was founded in that year it was with 
a much broader purpose than that which led to the estab- 
lishment of Harvard for the education of ministers. 

In the Autobiography Franklin preserves the records of 
several lesser writers of Philadelphia. On his first visit to 
Samuel Keimer (?-1738), the printer who 
de^Ma^Wd^^ S^ve him employment, he found that gentle- 
man at the case, composing, in a double sense 
of the word, an elegy on Aquilla Eose (1695?-1723). Eose 



100 American Literature 

had been an assistant in Keimer^s shop, and had written a 
number of promising verses, afterward collected as Poems 
on Several Occasions, Keimer himself produced a consider- 
able amount of prose and verse on various subjects. James 
Ralph (1695?-1762), who afterward became a successful 
London hack-writer, was a Philadelphian, and accompanied 
Franklin on his first visit to England. Other young men 
of literary tastes are mentioned in the Autobiography as 
members of Franklin^s famous club, "The Junto.'^ 

A more important Philadelphia writer was Thomas God- 
frey (1736-1763). After a brief attendance at school he was 
apprenticed to a watchmaker. He served as 
Godfrey ^ lieutenant in the militia during the cam- 

paign of 1758, and the next year went to 
North Carolina, where he spent much of the time until his 
death. During his brief lifetime he wrote several poems in 
which critics have found much promise, and the "Prince of 
Parthia,^^ so far as is known the first tragedy written in 
America. This, as the name implies, is an oriental tale, and 
the plot depends on the familiar motives of political ambi- 
tion and jealousy in love. It offers a goodly share of battles, 
intrigues, and crimes, and closes with the suicide of the hero 
and the heroine. It is written in blank verse, which the author 
does not handle so successfully as some of the lyric measures 
of his shorter poems. It would be foolish, however, to criticise 
the "Prince of Parthia'^ by any strict standard. It is the 
work of an unschooled boy of twenty-three years, who knew 
nothing of the stage, and had seen few if any plays. All 
things considered, it was not a discreditable attempt at a 
form of writing hitherto untried in America. It was played 
in Philadelphia April 24, 1767, but no details of the per- 
formance are known. 

In one department of knowledge — natural science — Phila- 
delphia easily surpassed all other colonial cities. It is true that 



The Colonial Time 101 

many New England divines — Cotton Mather for example — 
made observations in natural history^ and were prolific of 

theories regarding natural phenomena. But 
Philadelphia jj^ Philadelphia popular interest was more 
Science general, and there was more of the modern 

spirit of investigation and experimentation. 
Franklin is the best known of the Philadelphia writers on 
science. Among others was John Bartram (1699-1777), 
who founded the first botanical garden in America, and made 
extended excursions in search of specimens. Like Franklin, 
Bartram was a self-made man. James Godfrey (1704-1749), 
the father of Thomas Godfrey the poet, was a mathematician 
and inventor of what was later known as Hadley's quadrant. 
A still more distinguished jnathematician and scientist was 
David Eittenhouse (1732-1796), who made several valu- 
able inventions, and achieved international fame by his obser- 
vations of the transit of Venus in 1769. 

During the colonial time New York produced relatively 
little literature of importance. When the English took pos- 
„ session of the colony in 1664 they apparently 

caught something of the easy-going, pleasure- 
loving spirit of the Dutch settlers; and the little enterprise 
and activity that they showed was along commercial rather 
than intellectual lines. There was no such body of learned 
men as the New England clergy, and little attention was 
paid to the popular diffusion of knowledge. Schools were few 
and poor. Kings College, founded in 1754, and after the 
Revolution known as Columbia College, was for a time so 
involved in factional disputes that it accomplished little 
good. 

Like the other colonies, New York produced some ac- 
counts of the physical attractions of the country, and histories 
of contemporary events. One of the best of these was the 
History of the Five Indian Nations by Cadawallader Golden 



103 American Literature 

(1688-1776). Golden was the son of a Scotch minister. He 
came to Pennsylvania, and later to New York, where he prac- 
ticed medicine, and held various political 
WrM:ers^ offices. He took great interest in the troubles 

between the French and the colonies, and his 
history was written to show the relation of the Iroquois to 
this contest. The first part was published in New York in 
1727, and a continuation in London in 1747. It contains 
a large number of well-told anecdotes, and reports of speeches 
by Indian chieftains. Besides practicing his profession and 
engaging in politics Golden dabbled in many departments 
of natural science, and was a correspondent of Linnaeus, and 
other learned men. William Livingston (1723-1790), a 
native of Albany, a graduate of Yale in the class of 1741, and 
afterward a lawyer and politician in New York, occasionally 
tried his hand at verse. In 1747 he published Philosophic 
Solitude^ a moralizing and satiric poem in mediocre heroic 
couplets. He also wrote some minor verse and some contro- 
versial works in prose. He shows, more than most of his 
contemporaries, the direct influence of Pope. 



CHAPTER II 

The Eevolutionary Period (1765-1800) 

I. Controversial Writings 

In the middle of the eighteenth century literature in 
America showed no strong characteristics and no very defi- 
nite tendencies. The religious intensity that 
General Literary ij;^gpij.g(j gQ m^ch of the earlier writing was 

ceasing to be dominant, even in New Eng- 
land, and nothing was taking its place. People in America 
were coming more fully to realize that there was an English 
literature; and in a blind and half-hearted way they were 
beginning to imitate it, particularly in those forms which are 
always associated with the eighteenth century. In all parts 
of the country were men who rhymed in the heroic couplet 
and imitated the prose of the Spectator, In the more liberal 
colonies others attempted the drama, and made some slight 
efforts suggested by English fiction. But there was little 
life to any of this, and it could have had but little vital 
interest for contemporary readers. It is not strange, there- 
fore, that when the country was stirred by great political 
excitement, all writing should be concerned, closely or re- 
motely, with the new ideas. 

For at least a quarter of a century from the passage of 
the Stamp Act in 1765 the most important writings in Amer- 
ica dealt with the great political questions 
PoUticaf ^^ ^ ^^^^ before the people. Until the Declara- 
tion of Independence there was heated dis- 
cussion of the rights of the colonies. During the war there 
was enthusiastic patriotism and bitter hatred of England, 
met, of course, by the opposite feeling on the part of the loyal- 

103 



104 American Literature 

ists in America. After peace was declared there were differ- 
ences of opinion regarding the nature of the new govern- 
ment. When the Constitution was finally adopted, and 
Washington was inaugurated President, there was an in- 
creased feeling of nationality, and a disposition to exalt the 
United States and the principles for which it stood. So 
closely did literary expression follow changes in popular 
thought that each of these periods of political development 
might be considered a period in the history of American 
literature. For convenience, however, it is better to consider 
as a whole the years from the passage of the Stamp Act to 
the close of the century. This is the more desirable because 
as a rule the authors who were writing before the opening 
of the war continued after its close. The Eevolution was a 
young men's movement; and while not all the leaders lived, 
as did John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, a full fifty years 
after the Declaration of Independence, yet many of them 
continued active throughout the remainder of the eighteenth 
century. 

During the early part of the period the most numerous 
and in every way the most important writings are those that 

argue questions of colonial rights— the ora- 
on oversia tions, pamphlets, newspaper articles, and 

state papers which present various phases of 
the many-sided controversy. At first thought it might seem 
that such productions hardly require notice in a history of 
literature. Those of this time merit consideration in detail, 
however, not simply because they were the chief products 
of literary activity in America from 1765 to 1789, but be- 
cause they influenced in a great degree the literary taste 
and the later prose style of the country. 

The number and variety of these political writings is 
appallingly large. In the colonies where education was 
general, almost every town had its pamphleteers, or its 



The Eevolutionary Period 105 

writers for the public press. It is noticeable, however, that 
most of the productions that have survived in remembrance 
are the work of authors who are known for other achieve- 
ments than those of the pen. The ablest men in business and 
the professions took a hand in the controversy, and it is 
with their work that the student is chiefly concerned. 

The earlier difficulties between the colonies and the mother 
country centered in New England; and it was New Eng- 
. land men who first became prominent in the 

discussion. Among the earliest of these was 
James Otis (1725-1783), a native of Massachusetts, a gradu- 
ate of Harvard, and at the time discussion over colonial 
rights began, a prominent lawyer of Boston, with an especial 
reputation for success in criminal cases. In 1760 he pub- 
lished TJie Rudiments of Latin Prosody, for some time used 
as a textbook at Harvard college, but his other writings show 
little trace of the scholarly temperament. His first important 
appearance in political affairs was in 1761, when he made 
his famous argument before the Superior court of Massa- 
chusetts in opposition to writs of assistance. Tradition 
gives this speech great importance, and there is no doubt 
that it made a strong impression on those who heard it. 
There remain to us only some brief notes of the argument, 
taken by John Adams. 

Otis published several pamphlets, of which the most im- 
portant were, A Vindication of the Conduct of the House of 
Representatives of the Province of the Massa- 
chusetts Bay and The Rights of the British 
Colonies Asserted and Proved. The former of these was 
concerned with a controversy between the assembly and the 
royal governor, who had, it was claimed, exceeded his power 
in increasing the colonial defenses without legislative consent. 
The second, issued in 1764, was one of the many pamphlets 
discussing the relations between the colonies and Great Brit- 



106 American Literature 

ain, and dealt at some length with the nature of government 
and other questions of abstract political right. This is more 
moderate than most of the author's writings, and is, accord- 
ing to Professor Tyler, ^^the one work of Otis on which rests 
his reputation as a serious political thinker^'; but it is less 
typical of the author, and probably was less popular in its 
day than the Vindication, or the later answers to the 
^^Gentleman at Halifax/^ The most noticeable character- 
istic of these pamphlets is a rough and ready style, and a 
tendency to jumble together fact, argument, nonsense, and 
personalities, sometimes in confusing fashion. In this con- 
nection it is interesting to note that even in the early years 
of the Revolutionary agitation Otis showed some eccentrici- 
ties, and that when, in 1769, he was the victim of a per- 
sonal assault by political enemies he became hopelessly in- 
sane. 

Another writer on the colonial side who began his work 
during the early years of the controversy was Samuel Adams 

(1722-1803). He was born in Boston and 
Samuel Adams 

was graduated at Harvard in 1740. After 

his graduation he took up the study of law, abandoned this 
for business, and became, so far as his personal affairs were 
concerned, a ne^er-do-weel, subsisting on the small returns of 
a tax-collectorship and on the contributions of friends. 
Time which he might have devoted to his own business he 
gave to public affairs. 

Though Samuel Adams probably wrote more than any 
other politician of the time, he published little over his own 
name. The most numerous class of his writings consisted 
of letters to the newspapers and for these he is known to have 
used at least twenty-five different signatures. He was also 
prominent in town-meeting, assembly, and congress, and the 
most effective parts of the many reports, addresses, and me- 
morials issued by these bodies are often ascribed to him. 



The Eevolutionary Period 107 

Some of these public documents are able productions, char- 
acterized by logical method and a direct, dignified style. 
The letters to newspapers, and the personal letters that his 
biographer reprints, differ in tone according to the subject 
and occasion. The power of the author lay in the fact that 
he could appeal to almost every human motive, even the low 
and the transient, and yet could so guard himself that he 
had ^^nothing to retract/^ He was, in short, a consummate 
politician, who used his pen effectively for political pur- 
poses. 

John Adams (1735-1826), the more famous cousin of 
Samuel, was also a graduate of Harvard, and a resident of 
Boston. He took part in the agitation over 
the Stamp Act, and from this time almost to 
his death . he was a fairly prolific writer on politics and 
government, and incidentally on other subjects. His first 
important work was four papers published in the Boston 
Gazette in 1765, and afterward collected as an Essay on 
the Canon and Feudal Law, This he followed by other 
pamphlets and contributions to newspapers, among which 
was a series of articles signed ^^Novangelus^^ in response to 
Daniel Leonard, who wrote on the Tory side over the name_^ 
"Massachusettensis.^^ In 1776 he was a member of the com- 
mittee to draft the Declaration of Independence, but the 
work was done by Jefferson. From 1778 to 1788 he was 
most of the time on foreign missions, and had little chance 
to take part in controversies at home ; but he published some 
articles on America in newspapers abroad, and in 1787 
brought out in London the first volume of A Defence of the 
Constitutions of Government of the United States of Amer- 
ica. This work was later continued in two volumes more, 
and a sequel, entitled ''Discourses of Davilla,'' was begun in 
the ''Gazette of the United States'' in 1789, but was discon- 
tinued on account of the political protests that it aroused. 



108 American Literature 

Adams's personal letters during this period are also of great 
interest. 

Unlike his cousin, John Adams had little of the-:art which 
conceals the writer's personality and adapts modes of ex- 
pression to special occasions and special 
^^tii d classes of readers. In style nearly all his 

writings are representative of the man him- 
self. From early years he was a theorist on the nature of 
government. In his controversial writings he appeals to 
general principles rather than to temporary prejudices. 
Thus, his contribution to the discussion of the Stamp Act 
began with a general consideration of the canon and the 
feudal law. The Defense of the Constitutions is based on 
a detailed study of all representative governments from the 
earliest times. It might seem that this method of dealing 
with living political questions would be tedious and inef- 
fectual; but John Adams, though a theorist, was by nature 
a partisan and an advocate, and, especially in his early writ- 
ings, usually carried his readers with him. He had, however, 
a certain fondness for what may be called the legal mode 
of expression which sometimes interfered with his direct- 
ness. It is interesting to compare in respect to style his 
draft for the constitution of Massachusetts, written in 1779, 
and the constitution of the United States. His well-known 
petulance and uncertainty of temper are seen most plainly 
in his personal letters, but often make themselves manifest 
in his later writings intended for publication. 

James Otis, Samuel Adams, and John Adams represent 

respectively three classes of patriotic controversialists — the 

enthusiastic but often illogical agitator, the 

ee ypeso (3pgf|-y manipulator of meetings and writer 

of communications to the press, and the 

trained legal thinker who supported his position by appeals 

to history and to the fundamental principles of jurispru- 



The Eevolutionary Period 109 

dence. Other pamphleteers attracted equal or greater atten- 
tion for the moment, but these three now seem to stand out 
with the greatest prominence. 

Of the loyalist writers of Massachusetts the most notable 
was Daniel Leonard (1740-1829), already mentioned as an 

adversary of John Adams. He was a native 
hT^st^^''''^''^' of the colony, a graduate of Harvard, and 

engaged in the practice of law in Boston until 
he was forced to leave on account of his loyalist principles. 
In 1774-5 he published in a Boston paper the series of letters 
signed "Massachusettensis.^^ These are probably the strong- 
est statements of the loyalist case that appeared in New Eng- 
land, and for fairness of tone and excellence of literary man- 
ner were hardly surpassed by any pamphlets of the Eevolu- 
tion on either side. Indeed, their excellence is so great 
that it seems to have relieved Leonard from the suspicion of 
their authorship. John Adams himself was for many years 
convinced that they were the work of his friend Jonathan 
Sewall. 

Few political pamphleteers in the New England colonies 
other than Massachusetts deserve mention for the literary 

quality of their work. In Ehode Island Gov- 
New'^En land ^™^^ Stephen Hopkins (1707-1785) issued 
Pamphleteers ^^ 1^65 The Bights of Colonies Examined, 

a pamphlet in which he sets forth his views 
with the force and directness of a man who in earlier life 
had been farmer, land surveyor, merchant, and ship-builder. 
In response there appeared the earliest loyalist pamphlet of 
importance — A Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax to his 
Friend in Rhode Island, in which the loyalist claims are pre- 
sented in the frank and informal manner which might be 
used in a personal letter. The author was Martin Howard, 
of Newport, a man in regard to whom biographical informa- 
tion is scanty and strangely unsatisfactory. 



110 American Literature 

In the controversies which followed the Eevolntion, par- 
ticularly that over the adoption of the Constitution, New 
England took a prominent part; but no work 

}f^^^^ , , produced in this section of the country is 
New England ,, , , ^ ^ ii rm t-t 7 t , 

Controversialists worthy to be classed with I he Federalist, or, 

indeed, is of sufBcient importance to need men- 
tion in a literary history. In the closing years of the century 
the most noted New England orator, and one of the most popu- 
lar of the New England essayists, was Eisher Ames (1758- 
1808) . He was a Harvard graduate of 1774, a prominent mem- 
ber of the Massachusetts bar, and held various 
political offices. His most famous speech was de- 
livered in congress in 1796 in favor of Jay^s treaty with Great 
Britain. His political essays, contributed to Boston papers, 
were in. the English eighteenth century manner, and bore 
such signatures as ^^Camillus,^^ ^^Laocoon,^^ ^^Falkland,^' 
"Phocion,^^ etc. He was a master of a forceful and effective 
formal style, and his admirers, who gave him the nickname 
of "the American Burke,^^ were wont to amuse themselves 
by pointing out his resemblances to his supposed prototype. 
He deserves to be remembered for his influence on the next 
generation of American orators. 

While the political situation in the middle colonies was at 
first not so acute as in Boston, yet there were a great number 
of controversial writings in the years imme- 
Samuel^Seabury ^^^^^^J preceding the Eevolution. In New 
York the most prominent of the loyalist 
pamphleteers was Samuel Seabury (1729-1796), before the 
war pastor of a church in Westchester, and after its close con- 
secrated the first bishop of the American Episcopal church. 
In 1774 he attacked the Continental congress in three pam- 
phlets signed "A Farmer,^^ or "A. W. Farmer,^^ and he is 
also supposed to have been the author of some less important 
papers. The "Westchester Farmer'^ pamphlets purport to 



The Eevolutionary Period 111 

be written by a plain man *to others of his class; and the 
author succeeded in adapting his arguments to the common 
people without undue cheapness or lack of dignity. 

Among the many writers who replied to the ^^Westchester 
Farmer^^ the most important was Alexander Hamilton (1757- 

1804), then a boy of seventeen in attendance 
H^llton ^* King's, now Columbia, college. Hamilton 

was a native of the West Indies who had been 
forced by family misfortunes to enter a business office before 
he was thirteen years of age, and had shown such ability that, 
through the kindness of friends, he was sent to America for 
an education. His precocity is nowhere better shown than 
in the grasp of the entire subject of controversy manifested 
in his two pamphlets in reply to Seabury. At times his 
style has a terseness and definiteness that he may have ac- 
quired in part while writing business letters in the counting 
house at Jamaica. His few attempts at humor are only 
moderately successful, and the part of the pamphlet ad- 
dressed especially to farmers, while logically sound, is more 
artificially wrought than the rest. 

As Hamilton continued to write controversial documents, 
and during much of the Eevolution aided Washington in 

his correspondence, his style improved until 

it was nearly or quite at its best in the Fed- 
eralist. This remarkable series of papers, published in New 
York during 1787-8 with a view to influencing public senti- 
ment in favor of the proposed constitution, is the most 
famous and probably the most valuable political treatise that 
America has produced. Written as a controversial document, 
and printed in a newspaper during a political campaign, it has 
come to be regarded as an authority on the nature and prin- 
ciples of the American government, and is quoted by writers 
on constitutional law as almost equal in weight to the con- 
stitution itself. Its reputation rests mainly on its content; 



112 American Literature 

but it never could have been so authoritative at home, or 
have won such admiration abroad, if the great ideas which 
it sets forth had not been expressed with fitting simplicity, 
dignity, and clearness. So free is the work from tricks and 
mannerisms that it seems impossible to determine from in- 
ternal evidence the authorship of several disputed numbers. 
Hamilton originated the idea and certainly wrote more than 
half the papers. John Jay (1745-1829), another New 
York publicist, contributed a few, and James Madison some- 
what more. The few whose authorship is disputed lie be- 
tween Hamilton and Madison. 

In 1793 Hamilton wrote a series of essays signed ^Tacifi- 
cus^^ in which he advocated neutrality, and endeavoured to 

offset the effects of the Genet agitation ; later 
lT^^W^'i* ^^ published another series signed ^Tamillus^^ 

in support of the Jay treaty. The great mass 
of his published writings consist of letters and state papers 
written while he was serving the government in various 
capacities. Almost any of these documents illustrates Ham- 
ilton's excellence as a political writer, but none of them 
approaches the Federalist in importance. 

It must not be forgotten that during the Eevolution the 
most distinguished patriot of Pennsylvania was Benjamin 

Franklin, whose literary activities were con- 
Pennsylvania— si(jered in the preceding chapter. Franklin 
Franklin ^^^ abroad from 1764 to 1775, and from 1776 

to 1785, and America missed the witty and 
telling arguments and comments on events which he would 
surely have written if he had been at home during the most 
exciting years of the struggle. While in England he con- 
tributed to the London papers various articles intended to 
help the colonies, and the report of his examination before 
the House of Commons in 1766 was often reprinted and 
proved a valuable campaign document. 



The Eevolutionary Period 113 

The most prominent loyalist of Pennsylvania was Joseph 
Galloway (1729-1803), a personal friend and at one time a 
political associate of Franklin. In the first 
josep y QQj^^^jjgj^^^l congress he proposed a plan for 

home rule which is said to have been satisfactory to the 
government, but which was rejected by a vote of six colonies 
to five. It was virtually this plan which he expounded in the 
most notable of his many pamphlets, A candid Examination 
of the Mutual Claims of Great Britain and the Colonies; 
with a Plan of Accommodation on Constitutional Principles, 
The tone of this discussion is on the whole moderate, as was 
befitting one who was pleading for mutual concessions. 
The author does not, however, succeed in concealing his con- 
tempt for what he considers quibbling arguments of his 
opponents — for example the claim that Americans were sub- 
jects of the crown but not of Parliament, or that Parliament 
had a right to lay duties for the purpose of regulating trade, 
but not of raising revenue. 

The most expert manipulator of these fine-drawn distinc- 
tions that so irritated Galloway was John Dickinson (1732- 
,, ^. , . 1808). Like Galloway, he was a native of 

John Dickinson __ \ _ __ , ^ t . . ^^ '^ ^ ^ ^ - 

Maryland. He studied law m Philadelphia 
and London, and later held many important positions in 
both Pennsylvania and Maryland. His contributions to con- 
troversial literature won for him the name of ^Tenman of 
the Revolution,^^ and his latest editor says, ^^Prom no other 
leader of that movement originated a series of arguments 
of half the number, importance, or popularity.^^ The num- 
ber of his writings is certainly large, and there is abundant 
evidence of their popularity and infiuence. Nevertheless, the 
reader who makes their acquaintance for the first time is 
likely to be disappointed. There is, as Galloway charged, 
a great deal of hair-splitting; and the style, while clear, is 
not in any way attractive or remarkable. The controversial 



114 American Literature 

articles seem better calculated to please those already con- 
vinced than to make new converts. 

Dickinson's writings include many state papers, begin- 
ning with the declaration of rights and the petition to the 
king adopted by the Stamp Act congress, and continuing 
through most of the war. He was also a prolific writer of 
pamphlets and contributions to newspapers. The most 
famous of these is the Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer, 
which were published in 1767-8 and quickly attracted great 
attention at home and abroad. Unlike Seabury, Dickinson 
made no attempt to keep up the character of a farmer; but 
the style of the Letters is more direct and forcible than that 
of many of his writings. Dickinson's services did not end 
with the war, but when the ratification of the constitution 
was under consideration he supported it in a series of letters 
signed ^Tabius/' much in the manner of his earlier work. 
His once famous ^^Liberty Song'' will be mentioned in an- 
other connection. 

Thomas Paine (1737-1809), who came to Pennsylvania in 

1774, soon became one of the most famous citizens of the 

. colony. He was born in England, where he 

Thomas Paine in, , i 

had a not very prosperous career as stay-maker, 

exciseman, and usher at a school. At length Franklin, then 
in England, was struck by the excellence of a statement of 
grievances which he had drawn up for his brother excise- 
men, and offered him letters to friends in America. Soon 
after his arrival in Philadelphia he secured the editorship 
of the Pennsylvania Magazine. His few months of editorial 
work were evidently of great service in developing his literary 
style. Early in 1776 he published Common Sense, his first 
political pamphlet, and the first important tract advocating 
the independence of the colonies. From this time until the 
close of the war he was in the service of the country, with the 
army, as secretary of the committee of congress on foreign 



The Eevolutionary Period 115 

affairs, and as envoy to France. He also found time to write 
on political topics. His most important work of this period 
was The Crisis, a series of papers which appeared at inter- 
vals during the war, and had for its object to revive the 
spirits of the colonists, and to arouse public opinion in sup- 
port of the military operations. The first number begins : 

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and 
the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of 
their country ; but he that stands it now^ deserves the love and 
thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily con- 
quered ; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the 
conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, 
we esteem too lightly : it is dearness only that gives everything its 
value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods ; and 
it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as Freedom should 
not be highly rated. 

After peace was declared, Paine went abroad. He was 
outlawed from England on account of his Eights of Man, 
an answer to Burke^s Reflections on the French 
?"^clfeer" Revolution, published in 1791. In France he 
became a member of the National convention, 
opposed the execution of the king, and was imprisoned for 
a year. When he regained his liberty he censured Washing- 
ton for not attempting to secure his release, and in this way 
alienated many friends in America. A year or two later he 
published The Age of Reason, a work which long made his 
name a synonym for irreligion and atheism. Afterward he 
returned to America, where he died in 1809. 

This reference to Paine^s foreign career is necessary be- 
cause his later unpopularity was often remembered when 
his earlier fame was forgotten. When he left America at 
the close of the war few men were more generally esteemed 
for their services to the country; and it is conceded by most 
later historians that no contemporary writings exercised such 
influence as did Common Sense and The Crisis. It must be 



116 American Literature 

admitted that in most of Paine's work there is here and 
there to be found a flippancy^ a certain vulgar quality, offen- 
sive not only to his opponents but to the ju- 
M^n r ^ ^^^^ dicial minded ; and this quality is especially 
noticeable in his later writings, such as the let- 
ter to Washington and The Age of Reason. The Revolutionary 
pamphlets are relatively free from this fault. Common 
Sense, especially the central and important section entitled 
^^Thoughts on the Present State of the American Affairs/^ is 
characterized by plain, effective speaking, not often lack- 
ing in dignity. The Crisis, though it rarely rises to the 
height of the opening sentences quoted above, is probably the 
best written of Paine^s important works. It is true that the 
arguments are sometimes specious, and that an appeal is 
sometimes made to prejudices, but this is only saying that 
the essays were well planned to accomplish their purpose. 

The political literature of the South during the Revolu- 
tion was less in amount than that of the North, but not 
inferior in quality. Patrick Henry (1736- 
P ^ k^H 1799) began his career early in the contro- 

versy. He was of good, though not aristo- 
cratic, birth. At first he tried farming and trade, and 
succeeded in losing most of the money that he had received 
from his father and his father-in-law. He then studied law and 
soon acquired a reputation as a successful advocate. In 
1765 he was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses, and 
after this he held various political offices, among them mem- 
ber of the first Continental congress and governor of Vir- 
ginia. He opposed the adoption of the constitution, but 
became reconciled to it after the first ten amendments were 
adopted. In later life he was offered the positions of envoy 
to France, secretary of state, and chief justice of the United 
States, all of which he declined. 

Patrick Henry is known mainly as an orator; and his 



The Ee volution ary Period 117 

fame rests largely on the traditions of two speeches. The 

first of these was delivered in 1765, when, a young and 

, unknown backwoods lawyer, he succeeded in 

stampeding the House of Burgesses in favor 
of outspoken resolutions denouncing the Stamp Act. Of 
this address the only important part that has come down to 
us is the single interrupted sentence: ^^Caesar had his 
Brutus ; Charles the First had his Cromwell ; and George the 
Third — ^may profit by their example.^^ The second famous 
oration was pronounced ten years later before the convention 
called when the governor had dismissed the Assembly, and 
the old colonial government was at an end. A report of this 
speech is given in Wirt^s "Life of Patrick Henry,^^ which, 
though it cannot be traced to its origin, has been generally ac- 
cepted by tradition, and is perhaps better known than any 
other passage of American oratory. The section most frequently 
quoted is that beginning, "Mr. President, it is natural to 
indulge in the illusions of hope,^^ and ending with the words, 
"Give me Liberty, or give me Death.^^ Other speeches, the 
language of which is better authenticated, show a vigorous 
style well suited to oral delivery. They are not, however, 
remarkable productions in any way. Patrick Henry, like 
many other orators, must have derived his power mainly 
from his personality, and not from his literary style, or even 
from the logical quality of his argument. 

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), the greatest of the Vir- 
ginia statesmen except Washington, began his literary career 

'a little later than Henry. He was not ad- 

entrance into politics was in 1769, when he 
became a member of the House of Burgesses. His first im- 
portant contribution to revolutionary literature was made 
in 1774, when he wrote a draft of instructions to the Virginia 
delegates in Congress, a work afterward published as A Sum- 



118 American Literature 

mary View of the Eights of British America, The next year 
he filled a vacancy in the Continental congress, and was re- 
elected to the second congress. Though his writings were 
few, his ability was recognized, and he w-as chosen chairman 
of the committee to draft the ^^Declaration of Independence.'^ 
After the ^^Declaration'' was adopted he withdrew from na- 
tional affairs, and devoted himself to those of his own colony. 
He revised much of the legislative code of Virginia, and 
while governor wrote many letters and state papers of inter- 
est. Later, in answer to inquiries from the French govern- 
ment, he prepared his Notes on Virginia, This is an ac- 
count of the physical and industrial condition of the state, 
with some comments on social and political matters. It 
was first printed privately in France, but was afterward 
widely circulated. From 1784 to 1789 Jefferson was in 
France. His later writings, including many letters and state 
papers, and the Autobiography, are of the greatest value to 
the student of history, but show no characteristics not found 
in the earlier work. 

The best known production of Jefferson is of course 

the ^^Declaration of Independence," and in this are seen 

the chief characteristics of all his better 

The Declaration ^pi^ij^prs. He was by nature a theorist, or, 
of Independence . ° „ . ... 

as it was the fashion to say in his time, a 

philosopher; and he had a way of stating general principles 
with the dignity and sounding force that is fitting to the 
utterance of great truth. He was also a close observer and 
a man of wide interests, given to the collection of facts, and 
on occasion to their arrangement and presentation in an 
effective manner. These two characteristics are shown re- 
spectively in the opening paragraphs of the ^^Declaration,'^ 
and in the specific accusations against the king that follow. 
The charge sometimes brought against the ^^Declaration," 
and no doubt applicable to some of Jefferson's writings, is 



The Eevolutionary Period 119 

that the connection between facts and generalizations is 
neither as close nor as logical as it should be. The ^^Declara- 
tion/^ however^ expressed the ideas not of Jefferson as an 
individual, but of the American people as he and the other 
members of the committee understood them. It is unfair, 
therefore, to hold him too closely responsible for anything 
but the style; and this, though it has been sneered at as 
^^sophomoric,^^ showed by the immediate effect of the docu- 
ment, and by its hold on the people for over a century, that 
it was well adapted for its purpose. 

Daniel Dulany (1721-1797), a prominent lawyer of Mary- 
land, published at the time of the Stamp Act agitation a 

pamphlet entitled Considerations on the Pro- 
Lesser priety of Imposing Taxes on the British Col- 
on era onies. This is one of the calmest, clearest, and 
Controversialists . ^ \ 

most effective of the many arguments against 

taxation without representation. Its fame in later years was 
perhaps the less because the author advocated only peaceable 
means of resistance, and consistently refused to join in the war 
for independence. James Madison (1751-1836), of Virginia, 
a classmate of Freneau and Brackenridge, and another con- 
tributor to the Federalist, did his most important writing in 
connection with the framing and adoption of the constitution, 
though his career as a statesman extended well into the nine- 
teenth century. His literary taste was surer than Jefferson^s, 
but his writings lack some of the elements of popularity. 

In the work of moulding public opinion and stimulating 
popular enthusiasm political orations and pamphlets were 

aided by writings in forms more commonly 
icalTiterature" ^P^^^^ ^^ ^^ ''literary.'' Prose essays, fiction, 

and the drama were all used to express 
opinions on questions of vital contemporary interest. Some 
of the prose and much of the political verse of the time may 
be classed as satire, using this term in the broad sense which 



120 American Literature 

includes downright abuse as well as more delicate and cutting 
attacks. Ballads commemorating important events were 
sometimes satirical, sometimes laudatory. Songs of all kinds 
were common. All these production^ followed the fashions 
recently prevalent in England. A favorite prose form was 
the Addisonian essay. Verse satire was written in the heroic 
couplet of Pope, or in the tetrameter of Butler and Churchill. 
Ballads were of a few conventional types. Songs were usually 
written to some popular tune, and were often little more than 
parodies and adaptations of older originals. Among the 
most popular of these models was the English song ^^Hearts 
of Oak.^^ The tune which became known m "Yankee Doodle^^ 
was supplied with many sets of words. 

The best of these writings on the patriot side are the work 
of men who are known for other things, and who will be 

discussed later in this chapter. Many songs 
B U^d ^^^ ballads were anonymous, but with the 

exception of the different versions of "Yankee 
Doodle'^ few of these survived. John Dickinson composed a 
"Liberty Song'^ in the same earnest but uninspired manner 
in which he wrote his pamphlets. 

Come join hand in hand, brave Americans all, 
And rouse your bold hearts at fair Liberty's call ; 
No tyrannous acts, shall suppress your just claim, 
Nor stain with dishonor America's name. 

In freedom we're born, and in freedom we'll live ; 
Our purses are ready, 
Steady, Friends, steady. 
Not as slaves, but as freemen our money we'll give. 

Our worthy forefathers — ^let's give them a cheer — 
To climates unknown did courageously steer ; 
Thro' oceans to deserts, for freedom they came, 
And, dying, bequeath'd us their freedom and fame. 

Slightly less wooden is the "Pennsylvania Song,'^ which ap- 
peared anonymously about 1775. 



The Eevolutionary Period 121 

We are the troop that ne'er will stoop 

To wretched slavery, 
Nor shall our seed, by our base deed, 

Despised vassals be ; 
Freedom we will bequeathe to them, 

Or we will bravely die ; 
Our greatest foe, ere long shall know, 
Plow much did Sandwich lie. 
And all the world shall know, 

Americans are free ; 
Nor slaves nor cowards we will prove, 
' Great Britain soon shall see. 

Of the anonymous ballads the best is ^^N"athan Hale/' or 
^^Hale in the Bush/' which has a genuine poetic quality. 
It begins. 

The breezes went steadily thro' the tall pines, 
A saying "oh ! hu-ush !" a saying **oh ! hu-ush !" 

As stilly stole by a bold legion of horse. 

For Hale in the bush, for Hale in the bush, 

and concludes: 

The faith of a martyr, the tragedy shew'd, 

As he trod the lasl: stage, as he trod the last stage. 

And Britons will shudder at gallant Hale's blood. 
As his words do presage, as his words do presage. 

Thou pale king of terrors, thou life's gloomy foe. 
Go frighten the slave, go frighten the slave ; 

Tell tyrants, to you, their allegiance they owe. 
No fears for the brave, no fears for the brave. 

The Tory writings have been less carefully preserved, and 
the identity of the authors was in many cases never revealed. 
The two best known loyalist writers of verse 
J^^^JJ^^^^®" were Jonathan Odell and Joseph Stansbury, 
Stansbury whose fame is due to the fact that their names 

are associated with their writings, rather than 
to any superiority of their work. Odell (1737-1818) was 
an Episcopalian clergyman, a native of New Jersey, of old 
New England Puritan stock. He is known chiefly as the 



132 American Literature 

author of four satirical poems published in 1779, of which 
"The American Times^^ is the most representative. These 
are the sort of bitter satire that consists largely of vitupera- 
tion of measures and men: 

Virginian caitiff ! Jefferson by name ; 
Perhaps from Jeffries sprung of rotten fame. 
His savage letter all belief exceeds, 
And Congress glories in his brutal deeds. 

Joseph Stansbury (1750-1809), a Philadelphia crockery 
merchant, born in London and educated at Saint PauFs 
school, was a man of much cleverness and good nature. Most 
of his poems are lyrics; vi^hile they are intense in their de- 
votion to the king they lack the bitterness of OdelFs, and 
sometimes have even an element of playfulness. 

II. General Literature 

Purely political writings, numerous though they were, did 
not constitute all of the literary work done between 1765 and 
1800. Just before the outbreak of violent 
Literary At- discussion there had become noticeable in 

Ambitions various parts of the country an increased in- 

terest in literature. Men of literary tastes, 
many of them young scribblers in or just out of college, 
tried their hands at the lighter forms of writing then current 
in England, and occasionally at more ambitious productions. 
During the war these men naturally gave their attention to 
questions of the day, and confined themselves largely to po- 
litical satires and allegories, martial odes, and patriotic 
essays. After peace was restored they turned again to 
milder and more serious forms of literature. With the sense 
of political independence came the feeling that America 
should achieve literary independence as well; and writers 
throughout the country were seized with a desire to manufac- 
ture at once a great American literature. The serious attempts 



The Eevolutionary Period 123 

of these men form, from the viewpoint of to-day, one of the 
most amusing phenomena in the history of the nation. The 
feeling seemed to prevail that the first poet to complete an 
heroic poem in twelve books would be the American Homer, 
and the first to write an acceptable tragedy the American 
Shakespeare. The result was a flood of epics and dramas, 
accompanied by innumerable lesser works of all descriptions. 
The most important group or school of writers was a 
coterie of Connecticut men, mostly graduates of Yale, who 

came to be known as the ^^Hartford Wits.^' 
T^e Hartford rpj^^ leading members of the group were John 

Trumbull, Timothy Dwight, and Joel Bar- 
low. Associated with these were David Humphreys, Lemuel 
Hopkins, Eichard Alsop, Theodore Dwight, and others of 
still less importance. 

The causes that led to the transfer of literary supremacy 
from Massachusetts and Harvard college to Connecticut and 

Yale were partly accidental, and partly to be 
Literary traced in religious, political, and economic 

Connecticut conditions. Massachusetts men were by both 

temperament and position more active in re- 
ligion and politics. Harvard college, though nominally 
orthodox, was being infected with the liberalism that later 
led to the Unitarian schism, and already Was obliged to de- 
fend itself against many persons who regarded its tendencies 
as dangerous. At the opening of the war Boston was ag- 
gressive in resisting England, and in turn suffered more than 
any other city. It was natural that Boston men should be 
more bitter in political controversy, and that after the war 
they should devote themselves to other things than polite 
letters. Connecticut, on the other hand, was less disturbed 
by popular movements. The orthodoxy of Yale was un- 
questioned, even though many of the undergraduates were 
iilfluenced by French skepticism. The patriotism of the state 



124 American Literature 

was undoubted, yet feeling did not run so high as in the region 
of actual conflict. The Connecticut valley, already prosper- 
ous before the war, was soon after its close one of the richest 
sections of the country. With this worldly prosperity and 
this feeling of certainty regarding religious affairs came 
leisure for polite literature and a disposition to uphold vested 
rights, ^nd to look with suspicion on all radicalism. The 
Hartford convention of a later date was the outgrowth of ten- 
dencies already in operation. 

With the exception of Barlow all the Hartford Wits were 
conservatives in religion and politics, hating France, and 

opposing with especial vigor all political 
Hartfor Wi s measures that tended to shake public credit, 

or disturb the existing order of things. All 
of them, too, were disciples of the eighteenth century school 
of literature, accepting without question Addison as the great- 
est English master in prose, and Pope in verse. 

The eldest and probably the most talented of the Hartford 
Wits was John Trumbull (1750-1831), a descendant of an 

old New England family. Eemarkable stories 

are told of TrumbulFs precocity, the most 
notable being that he passed the entrance examinations for 
Yale college at the age of seven. He actually entered upon 
his studies in that institution in 1763, took his bachelor's 
degree in 1767, and his master's degree after three years 
more of residence as "Dean's scholar.'' After studying law 
for a year he was recalled to Yale for two years as tutor. He 
then went to Boston and read law in the office of John Adams 
until near the outbreak of hostilities, when he returned to 
New Haven and took up the practice of his profession. Later 
he removed to Hartford, where after the war he held various 
political offices. 

Trumbull's literary career began while he was a graduate 
student at Yale. In 1769-70 he wrote, probably with the 



The Eevolutionary Period 125 

assistance of Timothy Dwight^ the Medler, a series of essays 
obviously modeled on the Spectator, These deal with lit- 
erary, social, and even religious questions. 

Early Writinffs ^^* ^^ ^^^ touch politics. Later, in 1770, 
he published another series, the Correspondent. 
His commencement piece, spoken on the occasion of taking 
his second degree, was "An Essay on the Use and Advantages 
of the Fine Arts,^' written partly in prose and partly in the 
heroic couplet. During his tutorship at Yale he continued 
to write verse, producing several elegies and odes with obvious 
indebtedness to Gray and Milton. His most important pro- 
duction of this time was, however, The Progress of Dulness, 
a lively satire on modern education in three cantos of Hudi- 
brastic verse. This poem seems to be the literary result of a 
movement led successfully by some of the younger men at 
Yale in favor of greater attention to English composition, 
oratory, and helles lettres in that institution. 

Before Trumbull entered the law office of John Adams at 
the age of twenty-three he had, as has been seen, made sev- 
eral attempts at writing in both prose and verse, and had 
shown considerable proficiency in managing conventional 
literary forms. In Boston, as might be expected, he was 
diverted from literary criticism, theories of education, and 
social foibles to the all-absorbing topic of politics. In 1774 
he wrote an "Elegy on the Times,^^ a poem of sixty- three 
stanzas on the Port Bill and similar subjects. The next 
year, after he returned to New Haven, he pub- 
lished in Philadelphia the first part of 
McFingal, This satire, the work for which Trumbull is 
chiefly remembered, is a burlesque in Hudibrastic verse on 
the Tory sympathizers. McFingal, the butt of the poem, is a 
voluble loyalist of Scotch extraction. This first part of the 
poem, afterward divided into two cantos, tells of an exciting 
town meeting, and is largely polemical. The two later cantos. 



136 American Literature 

added in 1783 in response to popular demand, are a trifle 
broader in their humorous account of the tarring and feather- 
ing of McFingal, and the secret meeting of his adherents in 
his cellar. The real work of the satire in influencing popu- 
lar feeling was done by the first part. The poem is usually 
said to be modeled on Hudibras, though Professor Tyler 
thinks he finds more influence of the contemporary English 
satirist Churchill. A work of this kind is little read after the 
occasion that inspired it has passed into history; but the 
popularity of McFingal in its day was very great, and it was 
many times reprinted in the nineteenth century. Undoubtedly 
it was the most successful American political satire before 
the Biglow Papers. To-day it is known only by name and 
by a few pointed couplets : 

But optics sharp it needs, I ween, 
To see what is not to be seen. 

No man e'er felt the halter draw, 
With good opinion of the law. 

Trumbull took little part in the deliberate efforts put forth 
by his contemporaries to produce a new national literature. 
Although he lived until 1831^ his writing was almost all done 
before the close of the war. His only noteworthy publications 
of later date were political satires produced in collabora- 
tion with some of the lesser Hartford Wits. These will be 
discussed in another place. 

TrumbulFs friend and collaborator, Timothy Dwight 
(1752-1817), was graduated from Yale in 1769, taught 
«,. t TN . t_x school for two years, and in 1771 became 

T im nth Y Dwignt 

tutor at Yale at the same time as Trumbull. 
Tn 1777 he gave up his tutorship to become chaplain in the 
army. Afterward he lived at Northampton, where his grand- 
father, Jonathan Edwards, had lived before him, occupying 
himself as farmer, preacher, and member of the legislature. 



The Ee volution ary Period 127 

From 1783 to 1795 he was pastor of the church at Greenfield, 
Connecticut, and from 1795 to his death president of Yale. 
It should be noted that both as tutor and as president he did 
much to improve instruction in English and allied branches. 

While still an undergraduate but seventeen years of age 
Dwight was probably associated with Trumbull in the produc- 
tion of the Medler, and afterward of the Oor- 
of^Canaan respondent. Even before this he had made 

some metrical translations that had attracted 
attention, and a little later, in 1771, began his epic poem, 
the Conquest of Canaan. He tells us that this was finished in 
three years, but was not published until 1785. It contains, 
however, several references to events of the Eevolutionary 
war which must have been written later, and there is reason 
for suspicion that it ^\^as revised in other particulars. On the 
whole it seems more representative of 1785 than of 1774. 
It is a poem of eleven books in the heroic couplet, and treats 
of the subject named in the title, with considerable deviation 
from the Scripture narrative, for the sake of proportion in 
the story. Some of the verse is effective enough after a me- 
chanical fashion, but the poem as a whole is academic, plod- 
ding, and mediocre. The Eevolutionary battles and heroes 
that the author wishes to honor are introduced in extended 
similes, which ostensibly illuminate something in the narra- 
tive. 

The preface of the Conquest of Canaan is an interesting 
illustration of the attitude of American writers just after 
the close of the war. After a fulsome dedication to Wash- 
ington the author remarks that his epic ^^is the first of the 
kind which has been published in this country/^ makes un- 
abashed reference to the Iliad and Aeneid, and claims the 
liberty allowed to other poets of coining new words. In con- 
clusion he says : "As the poem is uniformly friendly to deli- 
cacy, and virtue, he hopes his countrymen will so far regard 



138 American Literature 

him with candour^ as not to impute it to him as a fault, that 
he has endeavoured to please them, and has thrown in his mite, 
for the advancement of the refined arts, on this side of the 
Atlantic/^ 

Not long after the publication of the Conquest of Canaan 
Dwight began the composition of Greenfield Hill^ a work 
which, however, did not appear in print until 
1794. This poem, in seven Parts, takes its 
name from the village of Greenfield where the author was 
pastor. As originally planned it was to imitate a different 
English poet in each Part, and although this plan was aban- 
doned, the imitation is still evident in many places. The 
metres employed are blank verse, the heroic couplet, the 
Spenserian stanza, and the octo-syllabic couplet. The titles 
of the different sections are ^^The Prospect,^^ "The Flourish- 
ing Village,'' "The Burning of Fairfield,'' "The Destruction 
of the Pequods," "The Clergyman's Advice to the Villagers," 
"The Farmer's Advice to the Villagers," and "The Vision." 
The author avows as his object "To contribute to the innocent 
amusement of his countrymen, and to their improvement in 
manners, and in economical, political, and moral sentiments ;" 
and though there is much pleasant description of simple rural 
life, especially in the earlier parts, the whole poem is pain- 
fully didactic. Some passages have value, however, as early 
examples of nature-appreciation in American poetry. 

Dwight was the author of several other works. While a 

chaplain in the army he wrought out the song "Columbia," 

the first stanza of which runs: 

Columbia, Columbia, to glory rise, 
The queen of the world, and child of the skies ! 
Thy genius commands thee ; with raptures behold, 
While ages on ages thy splendours unfold. 
Thy reign is the last, and the noblest of time, 
Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime. 
Let the crimes of the east neVr encrimson thy name, 
Be freedom, and science, and virtue, thy fame. 



The Eevolutionary Period 129 

Perhaps his most poetic bit of verse is the well-known para- 
phrase of the one hundred and thirty-eighth Psalm, be- 
ginning : 

I love thy kingdom, Lord, 

The house of thine abode. 

Less important writings of a later time were a verse satire, 
^^The Triumph of Infidelity/^ some observations on ^^Lan- 
guage/^ and an ^^Essay on Light/^ The year after Dwight^s 

death one hundred and twenty-three of his 
wig t s a er gg^j^Qj^g were collected and printed under the 

title of Theology explained and defended. 
In 1821 was issued his chief prose work, the Travels. These 
were based on a series of systematic vacation journeys in the 
course of which President Dwight traversed the greater part 
of New England and much of New York. They are in the 
form of letters addressed to an imaginary English gentleman, 
but were intended for American readers. They give many 
interesting and valuable facts regarding the localities visited 
by the author, and abound in all sorts of miscellaneous ob- 
servations. Their chief value is to the student of American 
social history. 

In many ways Timothy Dwight, though he had rather, less 
of genius than either Trumbull or Barlow, was the most 

representative of the Hartford Wits. Unlike 
S?imporSL'ce Trumbull, he continued writing throughout 

his life. The period before political discus- 
sion became all-absorbing is represented by his contributions 
to the Medler and the Correspondent; the years of the war 
by "Columbia;'^ the later period of literary striving by the 
Conquest of Canaan and Greenfield Hill. The author's limi- 
tations are also significant. The attempting of an epic, the 
deliberate imitation of English authors in a poem intended 
to be national, like Greenfield Hill, the fondness for formal, 
sounding passages of rhetorical verse, and the plodding, con- 



130 American Literature 

scientious, but uninspired, quality of all his work are charac- 
teristic of the school to which he belonged. 

Joel Barlow (1754-1812), the third of the best-known trio 
of Hartford Wits, was the most typical Yankee of them 

all. He took his bachelor's degree at Yale 

in 1778, and remained at the college for a 
time as graduate student. He seems to have hoped for a 
tutorship, but was disappointed, and turned to the study of 
law. Hearing that the troops were in need of chaplains, he 
took a six weeks' course in divinity, was licensed to preach, 
and ministered for some time to the army in New York. 
After this he kept a printing office, edited a country paper, 
and revised the translation of Watts's Psalms. Later he went 
to England, where he acted, no doubt innocently, as the agent 
of a swindling land company. From here he drifted to 
France, was made a Citizen, and served the French govern- 
ment in various ways. In 1805 he returned to America; in 
1811 he was appointed minister to France, and the next year 
he lost his life in Poland while endeavouring to join Napoleon 
during the retreat from Moscow. 

Barlow differed from most of his Connecticut contem- 
poraries in being less conservative in politics and religion. 

Consistency was not one of his chief virtues, 
Barlow s LiDeral ^^^ -^ -g impossible to say from what he wrote 

and did exactly what he believed. After his 
experiences in France his orthodox countrymen thought little 
good of him, and the Congregational church of Connecticut 
replaced his edition of the Psalms by a sounder, if less poet- 
ical, version by Dr. Dwight. Eeputable historians have also 
accused him of treasonable designs against his country. On 
the other hand, his admirers claim that he has been libelled 
and misunderstood. At all events he was inclined to be a 
liberal, and his liberal tendencies showed themselves in his 
writings. 



The Eevolutionary Period 131 

Barlow's literary aspirations seem to have been in the 
direction of verse rather than of prose. On the occasion of 
his graduation he read a poem on "The Pros- 
Bar ow s pg^^ ^£ Peace f and soon afterward he began 
a narrative and philosophical poem which oc- 
cupied his spare time during his chaplainship, and was pub- 
lished in 1787 as the Vision of Columbus. After leaving the 
army he contributed to the Anarchiad, a political satire 
which will be mentioned later, and turned out a number of 
miscellaneous trifles. While abroad he wrote in prose on po- 
litical subjects, his most important work being Advice to the 
Privileged Orders, published in 1792 and 1795. He also 
wrote a verse satire, "The Conspiracy of Kings.'' It was in 
1793, during his sojourn in Prance, that he produced his 
mock heroic poem "Hasty Pudding." In parody of the 
many poems inscribed in sounding phrases to the Father of 
his Country the author dedicated this effusion to Mrs. Wash- 
ington. The work has life, and movement, and real wit. 
In one or two places the humor, while not coarse, is not 
exactly refined, and unfortunately these are the passages 
most frequently quoted. 

Barlow seems never to have given up the idea of writing 

the great American poem, and in 1807 he published the 

^, ^ , , . , Columbiad. This is really the Vision of 
The Columbiad 

Columbus enlarged from nine to ten books, 

and altered in many respects, mostly for the worse. As in 
the earlier poem, Columbus in prison is visited by Hesper, 
the genius of the western world, who enables him to behold 
in detail the course of events in America to the time the 
poem was written, and in a more general way the greatness 
of the country thereafter. The verse is accompanied by pe- 
dantic and dogmatical prose notes, in which the author 
assumes to instruct the reader on all sorts of divergent sub- 
jects. Strangely enough. Barlow, always fond of rhetorical 



133 American Literature 

effect, became more bombastic as he grew older. Thus, in the 

Vision of Columbus, he wrote : 

The Hero turnM. And tow'rd the crowded coast 
Rose on the wave a wide-extended host, 
They shade the main and spread their sails abroad, 
From the wide Laurence to the Georgian flood, 
Point their black batteries to the approaching shore, 
And bursting flames begin the hideous roar. 

Twenty years later in the Columbiad these six lines were 

expanded into twenty-eight, part of which run: 

Columbus turn'd ; when rolling to the shore 
Swells o*er the seas an undulating roar ; 
Slow, dark, portentious, as the meteors sweep 
And curtain black the illimitable deep, 
High stalks, from surge to surge, a demon Form 
That howls thro heaven and breathes a billowing storm. 
His head is hung with clouds ; his giant hand 
Flings a blue flame far flickering to the land ; 
His blood-stain'd limbs drip carnage as he strides 
And taint with gory grume the staggering tides ; 
Like two red suns his quivering eyeballs glare, 
His mouth disgorges all the stores of war. 
Pikes, muskets, mortars, guns and globes of fire 
And lighted bombs that fusing trails expire. 

This is Barlow at his worst. Many passages of the Colum- 
hiad are in good imitative verse, and show a vigor and fire 
unknown to the author^s contemporary, Dwight. But the 
length of the poem, its ambitious title and plan, its bombast, 
and the author's pedantic notes have made it the stock ex- 
ample of the works produced in an attempt to manufacture 
a national literature. 

The other Hartford Wits were less important, and show 
much the same characteristics as Trumbull and Dwight. 
David Humphreys (1752-1818) was a gradu- 
m^^l^r^ ate of Yale, an aid-de-camp of Washington 
Humphreys ^^ ^^^ ^^^? ^^d afterward secretary of lega- 

tion at Paris. On his return he introduced 
merino sheep into America, an act for which he perhaps de- 



The Eevolutionary Period 133 

serves more credit than for his literary achievements. Dur- 
ing the war he wrote a metrical ^^Address to the Armies of the 
United States^^ which was widely reprinted and translated 
into French. A longer Poem on the Happiness of America 
also gained great currency. The Widow of Malabar, a tragedy 
adapted from the French, was acted at Philadelphia in 1790. 
Besides these works Humphreys wrote a Life of General Put- 
nam, and minor songs and poems. 

Lemuel Hopkins (1750-1801), a Hartford physician, 
Theodore Dwight (1764-1846), a cousin of Timothy Dwight 
and a Hartford and New York lawyer, and Kichard Alsop 
(1761-1815), who seems to have had no occupation but scrib- 
bling, were members of the same literary set. These men 
were given to collaboration — a practice more common among 
authors of the eighteenth century than now. In 1786-7 
Trumbull, Barlow, Hopkins, and Humphreys contributed to 

^, . , . ^ the "New Haven Gazette^^ American Antiqui- 
Tne Anarcniad 

ties^ better known as the Anarchiad, This 

series of papers illustrates the elaborate and ingenious manner 
then employed by the satirist. The first number reports the 
finding in some prehistoric ruins to the westward of "The 
Anarchiad, a Poem on the restoration of Chaos and sub- 
stantial Night, in twenty-four books.^^ This epic is con- 
jectured to be the oldest in the world, and Homer, Virgil, 
Milton, and Pope are said to have known and imitated it. 
This device made it possible to give parodies of these authors 
as extracts from the imaginary manuscript. The following 
is typical : 

Lo, the poor Briton, who, corrupted, sold, 
Sees God in courts, or hears him chink in gold. 

A heaven like London his fond fancy makes 
Of Nectar'd porter and ambrosial steaks. 
Not so, Columbia, shall thy sons be known, 
To prize the public weal above their own. 



134 American Literature 

The satire is directed against the Democrats, and especially 
against the leaders in Shays^s rebellion and the advocates of 
paper money. The title has reference to the reign of anarchy 
which all Connecticut Federalists believed would follow the 
triumph of the liberal party. 

Another satire of slightly later date was the Echo, begun 
in the "American Mercury'^ in 1791. Hopkins seems to have 
been the leading spirit in this, and among 
his fellow-workers were Theodore Dwight, 
Alsop, and probably Trumbull. It was started with the idea 
of ridiculing false literary taste, but soon became largely 
political and attacked Democratic measures and the prevalent 
enthusiasm for French ideas. It consists of poems in the 
heroic couplet burlesquing current writings of all sorts, such 
as bombastic newspaper reports, political speeches, and state 
papers. The same authors wrote many other diatribes in 
similar vein, particularly New Year's verses summarizing the 
political events of a year. For some reason not easily ex- 
plained from the quality of the work, the most famous of 
these is the "Political Greenhouse'^ for 1798, a strong satire 
in Hudibrastic verse. The greater part of the Echo and some 
of the miscellaneous poems were collected into a volume in 
1807. This volume shows the unfortunate, but marked, de- 
terioration in the tone of political satire which was taking 
place about the close of the century. The attacks on oppo- 
nents are personal and scurrilous. There is little wit, and that 
little is often coarse. Similar characteristics will be noticed 
in the work of Carey and other contemporary satirists of the 
middle states. 

It is hard for a reader of to-day to treat the Hartford Wits 
as seriously as they deserve. Their desire to increase the 
interest in literature and to stimulate literary production 
in the new country was a laudable one; but their attempt 
was so ambitious and so deliberate that it could not have im- 



The Revolutionary Period 135 

mediate success. Moreover, the fact that they were conserva- 
tives in taste as well as in principles led them to adopt lit- 
erary forms that were already becoming out- 
^gnMcance of ^orn. It is owing rather to the manner than 
-y^itg to the quality of their work that to-day there 

is little interest in any of their writings. In 
their generation their essays and verses were really enjoyed by 
many of their countrymen ; and English reviews by no means 
friendly to America gave much higher praise to the Columbiad 
and the Conquest of Canaan than the most patriotic American 
would think of giving now. It is not likely, if ever the 
pendulum of literary taste swings back, and the despised 
eighteenth century literature is again admired, that these 
imitative American attempts will regain their interest. But 
a careful study of the intellectual history of America shows 
that, though their manner was not followed, they had more 
influence on the development of a national literature than 
is often supposed. 

While the Hartford Wits were busily at work, literary pro- 
duction in Boston was meagre and unimportant. Massachu- 
setts had suffered much from the war, and com- 
Massachusetts ^ercial prosperity returned slowly. More- 
over, changes in religious belief and social 
conditions were absorbing the energies of thinking men. For 
these or other reasons few Massachusetts authors wrote anj?-- 
thing worthy remembrance in the years immediately after 
the war; and of these few the majority were women. 

Mercy Otis Warren (1728-1814), sister of James Otis and 
wife of James Warren, another political leader, was prolific 
of both prose and verse. Her ^^Adulator^^ 
wT^ei?*'^ (1773) and ^The Group^^ (1775) are dra- 

matic sketches in which contemporary char- 
acters figure under fictitious names. Mrs. Warren had no 
touch of humor, and these dramatic satires, if they may be so 



136 AMERicA2sr Literature 

characterized, :are very heavy and very severe. Her tragedies, 
the ^^Sack of Kome^^ and the "Ladies of Castile/^ also teach po- 
litical lessons. Besides her satiric and dramatic works she 
wrote a history of the Eevolution "interspersed with biographi- 
cal, political, and moral observations,^^ published in 1805. Her 
relationship to two leading families and her acquaintance 
with the most prominent men of the country make her work 
of much interest and considerable value. She had an ex- 
tensive correspondence with many of the best known men and 
women of her time, and her letters are models of dull, formal 
propriety. Over the signature "Philomela^^ she addressed 
Mrs. Winthrop as "Honoria^^ and Mrs. Adams as "Portia."*^ 
Among her contemporaries she was noted for her ability to 
draw "characters,^^ especially of persons whom she disliked. 
These sharp and unsympathetic portrayals often made her un- 
popular, and her characterization of John Adams in her his- 
tory led to a wordy controversy with that irascible statesman 
that is now perhaps better known than any of her other works. 

Phillis Wheatley, a slave girl born in Africa about the 
middle of the eighteenth century, brought to America in her 
childhood, and educated by Mr. Wheatley of 
^ Boston, wrote a considerable number of verses. 
They are good conventional work in the forms then popular, 
devoid of originality, but really remarkable considering the 
history of the author. That they have been remembered is 
partly due, however, to the fact that in the days of the abo- 
litionists they were often cited to prove the intellectual capa- 
bility of the negro. 

Susanna Haswell Eowson (1762-1824) should perhaps be 
mentioned here, though her most popular book was written 

in England, and several of her writings bear 
Susanna Has- ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^ ^g^^^ ^^^ ^^^ ^^^ daughter 
well Rowson « -^ . . . , , ^ , n . a 

of a British naval oincer who. served m Amer- 
ica and married a Boston woman. At the outbreak of the 



The Eevolutionary Period 137 

war Susanna, a child of fourteen years, went to England with 
her parents, where she afterward became governess in a 
noble family, was married, and began her career as an au- 
thor. Her first novel, Victoria, appeared in 1786. ^^The 
characters are taken from real life, and the design of the 
work is ^to improve the morals of the female sex by impressing 
them with a just sense of the merits of filial piety .^^^ The 
same description might with slight change be applied to 
most of Mrs. Eowson^s works. Charlotte Temple, the only 
one now remembered, was published in London in 1790. Three 
years later Mrs. Eowson came to America, where she first 
went on the stage, and then conducted for twenty-five years a 
fashionable school for girls in and near Boston. During 
her theatrical experience she wrote an opera, a farce, and 
some other works, and later published poems, essays, and 
stories, all sentimentally didactic. The novel Sarah, the Ex- 
emplary Wife, with the motto ^^Do not marry a fooy^ is said 
to be based on her own matrimonial experience. 

Another Boston writer of some note in his day was Eobert 
Treat Paine, Jr. (1773-1811), son of the signer of the Dec- 
laration. He was christened Thomas, but 
Pain/ t/^^ secured a legal change of name because of the 
odium that attached in New England to the 
greater Thomas Paine. After taking a degree at Harvard he 
entered business, but gave much of his time to writing. In 
1794 he established the ^^Federal Orrery,^^ in which he pub- 
lished the ^^Jacobiniad^^ and the ^^Lyars,^^ political satires that 
made him many enemies. When at last Puritan Massachusetts 
permitted stage plays he wrote a prize prologue for the open- 
ing of the first theatre in Boston. After his newspaper ven- 
ture failed he became more closely connected with theatrical 
matters, and married an actress. For a time he studied and 
attempted to practice law, but his naturally indolent dis- 
position and increasing habits of dissipation prevented sue- 



138 American Literature 

cess, and he died in extreme poverty. This wretched close of 
his career was ascribed bj^ the more Puritanical residents of 
Boston to his connection with the theatre, and his life was 
often cited to point a moral. His poetical works include 
many occasional poems, all in the heroic couplet, among them 
the prologue already referred to and ^^The Ruling Passion,'' 
delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard. 
He also wrote a number of rather bombastic patriotic songs, of 
which ^^Adams and Liberty'^ was the most famous. 

Among the minor Massachusetts writers was Mrs. Hannah 
Adams (1755-1832), author of a Dictionary of Religions, a 
History of the Jews, a History of New Eng- 
ckusetts )Vrite s ^^'^^^ ^^^ several other works. All these were 
long considered excellent reading for the 
young, and may still be found in old libraries. Hannah W. 
Foster (1759-1840), born in Boston and after her marriage 
a resident of Brighton, Massachusetts, also wrote moral books 
for young ladies. Her most popular story. The Coquette, or 
the History of Eliza Wharton, was published in the last years 
of the eighteenth century, and reprinted many times after- 
ward. Dr. Benjamin Church, a Boston physician of consid- 
erable culture and ability, wrote a number of miscellaneous 
poems, including patriotic songs, and a long verse satire, 
^^The Times,'' dealing principally with the Stamp Act. He 
was accused, however, of being a loyalist in disguise, and of 
writing Tory parodies on his own poems. Early in 1776, 
after being imprisoned for some time, he was forced to leave 
the country, and the ship on which he took passage was lost 
at sea. 

In the other New England states literary production was as 
slight as in Massachusetts. Eoyall Tyler (1757-1826), a 
native of Boston, a Harvard graduate, and for a time a stu- 
dent in the law ofRce of John Adams, removed to Vermont, 
where he finally became chief justice. He is remembered for 



The Eevolutionary Period 139 

his comedies, The Contrast, and May-Day or New York in 

an Uproar. The former, said to be the first play in which the 

Yankee dialect was introduced for purposes 

Other New ^f comedy, was played in ISTew York in 1786. 

England States _ , . , -i , t . . i ^ct^ ^ ^ t „ 

— Royall Tyler Tyler also contributed to the Portiolio and 

other magazines, and wrote The Algerine 
Captive, a story of piracy and adventure in the form of me- 
moirs interspersed with many expressions of opinion on po- 
litical and social topics. 

To Colonel Eobert Eogers (172M800?), a native of New 
Hampshire, and a soldier of wavering allegiance in both the 

French and Indian and the Eevolutionary 

wars, is ascribed the tragedy of Ponteach, or 
The Savages of America. The play represents the Indians 
as simple and trustworthy people, victimized by white 
soldiers, traders, hunters, and even missionaries until revolt 
was a virtue. This is a somewhat unusual view for a soldier 
like Eogers who had seen much of frontier life ; and there is 
a possibility that he may not have written the play. 

Jonathan M. Sewall (1748-1808), a native of Salem 
and a graduate of Harvard, lived most of his life in New 

Hampshire. His poems, published in 1801, 

inor ew ^^^ most of them written much earlier, in- 

England Writers . . „ » 

elude metrical versions of nearly the whole of 

Ossian, some bombastic patriotic songs, and many miscel- 
laneous lyrics. Some of the latter have smoothness and life, 
and those of a lighter nature are often cleverly turned. Dr. 
Joseph Brown Ladd (1764-1786) was born and educated in 
Ehode Island, though most of his poems were not published 
until the last two years of his life, when his residence was 
in Charleston, South Carolina. He was a precocious boy, 
who seems to have accomplished wonders in self-education. 
His Poems of Arouet, published in the year of his death, are 
formal poetical epistles to his lady-love Amanda, written 



140 American Literature 

while he was studying medicine in Khode Island. His Lit- 
erary Remains, brought out by his sister in 1832, include 
paraphrases of Ossian, and of parts of the Bible, patriotic 
and miscellaneous poems, and critical and scientific essays in 
prose. His verse, though juvenile, shows some individuality 
and promise, and his early death in a duel at the age of 
twenty-two may have prevented really noteworthy work. 

New York, which in the next century was to become the 
literary center of the country, was before 1800 a provincial, 
commercial town, paying little attention to 
W'Ui ^^d"i literature. The theatre was permitted earlier 
than in Boston, and for this reason there were 
a few attempts at play- writing, most of them unworthy of 
mention. William Dunlap (1766-1839), artist and author, 
whose biographical and critical works belong to the nineteenth 
century, was for some years manager of a ITew York theatre, 
and wrote and adapted many plays. Among the most im- 
portant of his original productions were The Father, a comedy 
played in 1789, Leicester, sl tragedy written in 1790 and 
played in 1794, and Andre, an historical drama played in 
1798. The adaptations were from various sources, but be- 
ginning with the Stranger in 1798 the greater number were 
from Kotzebue and other authors of the sentimental school. 
Dunlap was a manager seeking to meet the popular demand, 
and his plays doubtless seemed better to the audiences who 
saw them than they do to the reader now. He has an im- 
portant place in the history of the American stage, and his 
fame has been appropriately revived by the ^^Dunlap Society," 
which printed a number of works on the national drama. 

Philip Freneau (1753-1832) was born in New York city, 
but he should be associated with New Jersey, where he spent 
much of his life. He was graduated from Princeton in 1771. 
Even as an undergraduate he did much writing, and collabo- 
rated with his classmate, H. H. Brackenbridge, in a poem. 



The Eevolutiokary Period 141 

^^The Eising Glory of America/^ spoken by the latter at com- 
mencement. He wrote his first political satires early in 1775, 

and later in the same year sailed to the West 
Phm F^^^ u I^^i^^- During the voyage the mate died, 

and Freneau, though apparently without ex- 
perience as a sailor, took his place. At this time he seems to 
have acquired his love of the sea. He returned to America 
in 1778, and thereafter was -alternately at sea and engaged 
in writing and editorial work ashore. His most notable 
voyage was one undertaken in 1780, which ended in his cap- 
ture by the British and his confinement in a prison ship in 
New York harbor. His experience during this imprison- 
ment was the basis for one of his most scathing poems. The 
most important of his editorial experiences was in connection 
with the ^^National Gazette,^^ which he founded in Philadel- 
phia in 1791. At this time he held a very minor clerkship in 
the department of state. As his paper was strongly anti- 
Federalist and pro-French, the charge was made that Jef- 
ferson, then secretary of state, was subsidizing the editor with 
government money. A scandal arose which seems ridiculous 
now, but which resulted in the abandonment of the ^^Gazette.^^ 
Freneau was a prolific writer. He issued volumes of verse 
in 1786, 1788, 1795, 1809, and 1815, and these contain by 

no means all his poems. Most of these vol- 
reneaus nmes are rare, and for many years the only 

collection of his works readily available was 
Poems relating to the American Revolution, edited by Evart 
A. Duyckinck in 1865. It was probably for this reason that 
Freneau came to be known chiefly for his political poems — 
work which is neither his best nor his most distinctive. 
Unfortunately his latest editor. Professor F. H. Pattee, has 
accepted and helped to perpetuate the designation "Poet of 
the American Eevolution/^ 

The political poems of Freneau were mostly written in the 



142 American Literature 

year 1775, before the trip to Jamaica, and in the few years 

immediately following the return from this trip in 1778, 

^ ,. . , „ . though a considerable number were produced 
Political Satires , , ^ . ^i n . ,^ ^.^.^ rr.. 

later, especially durmg the war of 1812. They 

are classed as satires, though most of them are downright 

attacks on measures and men, with no touch of lightness or 

humor. The following lines on Cornwallis are typical : 

What pen can write, what human tongue can tell 
The endless murders of this man of hell ! 
Nature in him disgraced the form divine ; 
Nature mistook, she meant him for a — swine: 
That eye his forehead to her shame adorns ; 
Blush ! nature, blush — bestow him tail and horns ! — 

Convinced we are, no foreign spot on earth 
But Britain only, gave this reptile birth. 
That white-clifPd isle, the vengeful dragon's den, 
Has sent us monsters where we lookM for men. 

Strange as it may seem, the man who wrote great quanti- 
ties of verse like this was possessed of a vivid and powerful- 
imagination, a lightness and delicacy of poetic 
unaginative fancy, and even a considerable faculty of 
humor. These contradictions in the character 
of his poetic work are hard to explain. His latest editor en- 
deavours to trace a change in temper, with disillusionment and 
loss of the romantic spirit, but the dates of his poems hardly 
support this theory. Many of the lightest and most delicately 
imaginative verses were contemporaneous with, or follow, the 
most bitter political writings. The man seems really to 
have possessed two natures. The bitterness of the satires is 
clearly genuine, and the fineness and delicacy of the lighter 
work is just as clearly an expression of real feeling. 

Freneau's earliest attempts include a considerable amount 
of light and humorous verse, with some satire, but no more 
than is to be expected of the average collegian. Even as an 



The Eevolutionary Period 143 

undergraduate he was responding to the influence of Gray, 
and of Milton^s minor poems. He also showed at an early age 

the peculiar sense of the personality of natu- 
Frene^s ^^^ objects that characterizes some of his best 

poems. Perhaps the most important of his 
early works is ^Tictures of Columbus/^ said to have been writ- 
ten in 1774. This consists of eighteen sections, each portray- 
ing a scene in the life of the hero. Several of these are in blank 
verse — a form which Freneau mastered rather late. The 
passages in lyric measures are more striking. In the inter- 
view between Columbus and an enchantress is shown rather 
crudely some of the weird imagination which distinguished 
several of his earlier poems : 

The staring owl her note has sung; 
With gaping snakes my cave is hung; 
Of maiden hair my bed is made, 
Two winding sheets above it laid. 

During his stay in Jamaica Freneau wrote several poems, 
the most strikingly imaginative of which is the ^^House of 
ISTight.^^ The theme is the death of Death. Freneau^s poem 
is very uneven, and taken as a whole it is in no way to 
be compared to the work of Swinburne and Poe, who 
have treated the same idea; but some stanzas have real 
power : 

Rude, from the wide extended Chesapeke 

I heard the winds the dashing waves assail, 

And saw from far, by picturing fancy form'd, 
The black ship travelling through the noisy gale. 

Less restrained, but not without a certain energy and vivid- 
ness are passages like the following: 

Nor look'd I back, till to a far off wood. 

Trembling with fear, my weary feet had sped — 

Dark was the night, but at the inchanted dome 
I saw the infernal windows flaming red. 



144 American Literature 

And from within the howls of Death I heard, 
Cursing the dismal night that gave him birth, 

Damning his ancient sire, and mother sin, 

Who at the gates of hell, accursed, brought him forth. 

Dim burnt the lamp, and now the phantom Death 
Gave his last groans in horror and despair — 

"All hell demands me hence," — he said, and threw 
The red lamp hissing through the midnight air. 

Even more significant than the over-wrought imagination 
of ^^The House of Night^^ is the author's delicate and sympa- 
thetic treatment of nature. Some of the 

Poems o?Nature P«^™'' '"^^ ^^ "^^^ ^^^^^ '^^" ^""^ "^^ 
the Sleep of Plants/' ascribe to natural objects 

a personality, a sort of kinship with man, such as no other 
American poet of the eighteenth century dreamed of. ^^The 
Wild Honeysuckle/' which often represents Freneau in the 
anthologies, is excellent in form, but more conventional in 
idea. Several poems to insects and animals, such as ^To a 
Caty-did/' ^^To a Dog/' "On a Honey Bee Drinking from a 
Glass of Wine and Drowned therein," show a genial, half- 
humorous tendency which is strange in the author of the 
political satires. The Indians and the fate which overtook 
them are also touched upon in more than one poem. "The 
Indian Burying Ground" well deserves to be remembered 
independently of the fact that Campbell borrowed without 
credit the last line of the stanza : 

By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews ; 

In habit for the chase arrayed, 
The hunter still the deer pursues, 

The hunter and the deer, a shade ! 

The reawakening of interest in Freneau's non-political verse 
not many years ago led to absurd over-praise. The assertion 
w^as sometimes made that he was an important precursor of 
the romantic movement, anticipating in many ways Words- 



The Eevolutionary Period 145 

worth and Coleridge. The most that can safely be said is 
that he was strongly influenced by the same poets who in- 
fluenced the earlier romanticists in England, 
of^F en^u^ and that in comparison with his contempo- 

raries he showed more originality and inde- 
pendence of thought, more imagination, and a finer feeling 
for nature. His exact relations to romanticism are, however, 
worthy of more careful study than they have received. ^^The 
House of Night'^ was written after Vatheh and the poems of 
^^Ossian,^^ but before the writings of Mrs. Eadcliffe, "MonF^ 
Lewis, Godwin, and Blake. A search for the sources of the 
weird imagery in this poem, and a comparison between Fre- 
neau^s attitude toward nature and that of his English con- 
temporaries might yield some interesting results, though it 
would not show him to be the leader in the new movement. 
With all his defects, Ereneau seems sure of a place in the his- 
tory of American literature. He is the most important 
American poet before Bryant, and he is one of the very few 
writers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries whose 
work deserves attention for its intrinsic merits alone. 

To New Jersey may also be credited John Woolman (1720- 
1772), the Quaker, an intense mystic who, guided by the 
Inner Light, travelled much among his sect 
in America and England, and left a Journal 
in which he recorded his experiences. The gentleness and 
simplicity of this short autobiography endear it to readers 
who can appreciate devout and wholly impractical idealism. 
It won high praise from Charles Lamb, and it was edited by 
Whittier, who was drawn to. the author both as a brother 
Quaker and as an opponent of slavery. 

Among the signers of the Declaration from New Jersey 
was Francis Hopkinson (1737-1791), one of the cleverest of 
the light writers of the Eevolutionary time. He was born in 
Philadelphia, was educated at the college of Philadelphia, 



146 American Literature 

afterward the University of Pennsylvania, and studied law. 
His activities, however, were never confined to his profession. 

He was prominent in many civic societies, 
TT^^n served for a time as secretary and librarian 

of the Library Company of Philadelphia, 
and spent a season abroad. In 1768 he married Miss Borden, 
of Bordentown, New Jersey, and removed to that place, but 
again took up his residence in Pennsylvania before the close 
of the war. In both states he held various political positions, 
and at the time of his death was United States district judge 
for Pennsylvania. 

Hopkinson was a versatile writer of both prose and poetry. 
His prose essays in his collected works bear such varied titles 
as ^^An Improved Plan of Education,^^ ^^A new Game of Cards 
for the Improvement of Orthography,^^ ^^Speech of a Post in 
the Assembly-Eoom,^^ ^^Improved Method of Quilling a Harp- 
sichord,^^ "Dialogues of the Dead,^^ "Address to the Philo- 
sophical Society.^^ He was especially happy as a satirist, and 
his political burlesques, "A Pretty Story^^ on the troubles with 
Great Britain, and "The New Eoof,^^ on the proposed consti- 
tution, are still remembered. Even better conceived are some 
of his satires on less important themes, such as his parody on a 
college examination. The best of his verses are a few grace- 
ful little songs which he wrote and set to music; but the 
best known is the "Battle of the Kegs,'^ a ballad on the alarm 
caused :among the British by infernal machines floated down 
the river into Philadelphia. Hopkinson was a somewhat rare 
example, in the stirring Revolutionary times, of the accom- 
plished gentleman who combined with excellence in his pro- 
fession an easy proficiency in the arts of music, drawing, 
versifying, and essay-making. 

Hugh Henry Brackenridge (1748-1816) was born in Scot- 
land, but came to Pennsylvania as a boy. He was graduated 
at Princeton in the same class with Freneau, and served for 



The Eevolutionary Period 147 

a time as tutor in the college. Later he taught school, edited 
the ^^United States Magazine/^ studied divinit)^ and was an 
army chaplain. After the close of the war he 
B^^k ^"d^ studied law and removed to Pittsburg, where 
he had some connection with the Whiskey 
Insurrection of 1794. From 1799 until his death he oc- 
cupied a seat on the supreme bench of Pennsylvania. Like 
Hopkinson, he scribbled for recreation, though the tem- 
per of the men was widely different. The Gazette Publica- 
tions, a volume in which he collected many of his shorter 
writings, contains a sketch of Pittsburg, burlesque poems 
on dueling and on political subjects, a ^^Masque^^ on the warm 
springs of Virginia, the verse of which is strongly imitative of 
^^Comus,^^ several sermons, a drama on Bunker Hill, and 
many miscellaneous trifles of all sorts. His most ambitious 
work is Modern Chivalry, or the Adventures of Captain Far- 
rago and Teague O'Regan, This is a rambling 
prose burlesque showing the influence of Don 
Quixote in the plan, and of Smollett, Sterne, and Fielding in 
the manner. The Captain starts out to see the world, ac- 
companied by his servant Teague, who is the butt of the story, 
and whose misadventures furnish opportunity for the humor 
and for a great deal of half-hidden satire on democracy. 
In the first part, published in Pittsburg in 1796, some of the 
situations are amusing, and the humor, though coarse, is genu- 
ine. The second part, published in 1806, has a stronger po- 
litical bearing, and is less successful. 

In the latter part of the eighteenth century Philadelphia 
was the American city that most attracted cultured immi- 
grants and visitors from abroad. Xew York 
Cultured Immi- ^^g j^q^ yg^ ^^ important port, and Boston 
Philadelphia ^^^ under a cloud from the effects of the 
war. The fact that Philadelphia was the 
home of Franklin^ the American who was best known in 



148 American Literature 

Europe, perhaps aided in attracting attention to the city. 
Mention has already been made of Thomas Paine, whose 
writings were almost wholly political. At a little later time 
several other immigrants were concerned with other forms of 
literature. 

To Pennsylvania, if to America at all, belongs Jean Hector 
St. John de Crevecoeur, a native of Normandy, who was edu- 
cated in England and came to America in 
Jean ^^^*^^ 1754. During the war he seems to have been 
Crevecoeur neutral, and after a visit to France in 1782-3 

he served for a time as French consul at New 
York. During much of his stay in America he was engaged 
in farming, and the work by which he is known is entitled Let- 
ters of an American Farmer, These letters, published in Eng- 
lish in 1782, and afterward translated by the author into 
French, are gossipy, and have a pleasing though somewhat 
artificial style. They are not, like so many published letters 
from America, written to attract or deter immigrants, but 
show the results of an accurate and kindly observation of the 
natural features and the inhabitants of the New World. In 
a manner that contrasts charmingly with the formal essays 
of his contemporaries, Crevecoeur writes on such topics as 
"What is an American ?^^ "Manners and Customs of Nan- 
tucket,^^ "On Snakes ; and on the Humming Bird.^^ 

Peter Markoe (1753-1792?), who was born in the West 
Indies, educated at Trinity college, Dublin, read law in 

_ „ , London, and came to Philadelphia in 1783, 

Peter Markoe 

should be remembered among the literary im- 
migrants to Pennsylvania. He wrote under the assumed 
name "A Native of Algiers^^ a tragedy. The Patriot Chief, and 
a comic opera. The Reconciliation, besides miscellaneous 
poems — all ambitious but rather commonplace work. 

Some of the other writers who came to Pennsylvania con- 
cerned themselves with politics. William Cobbett (Peter Por- 



The Eevolutionary Period 149 

cupine), the English editor, was in Philadelphia from 1793 
to 1800 and wrote in support of the Federalists. Cobbett 

should hardly be classed as an American 
Political Writers author, but he must be mentioned, if not for 
Cobbett ^^^ ^^^ writings, then for what was written 

about him. It was his habit to attack vigor- 
ously and directly everything and everybody that he disliked, 
and his tirades elicited from indignant Americans many pro- 
tests which are often in a manner similar to his. He must be 
held partly responsible for the unfortunate loss of dignity 
and respectability that is seen in political satire a-bo.ut the 
close of the century. 

One of Cobbett^s opponents was Mathew Carey (1760- 
1839), a vigorous and versatile Irishman who in 1784 found 

it necessary to leave his native country on 

account of political troubles. During a 
former exile he had met Franklin in Paris, and it was prob- 
ably owing to this fact that he came to Philadelphia. Here 
as publisher, editor, and book-seller he was a prominent char- 
acter for over fifty years, his activities ranging all the way 
from fighting a duel with a rival editor to organizing the first 
American Sundaj^ School society. In the year of his arrival 
in America he established the "Pennsylvania Herald,^^ and 
afterward edited the "American Museum.^^ In 1793 he pub- 
lished a History of the Yellow Fever, and in 1796 a small 
volume called Miscellaneous Trifles, containing short stories, 
Addisonian sketches, papers on the stage, etc. In 1799 ap- 
peared his Plumh Pudding for the Humane, Chaste, Valiant, 
Enlightened Peter Porcupine, an attack on Cobbett, whom 
he hated with the combined hatred of a Democrat for a 
Federalist and an Irishman for an Englishman. He 
writes : 

But, wretch as you are, accursed by God, and hated by man, the 
most tremendous scourge that hell ever vomited forth to curse a 



150 American Literature 

people, by sowing discord among them, I desire not the honour or 
credit of being abused or vilified by you. . . . 

To send a challenge to a blasted, posted, loathsome coward, who, 
a disgrace to the name of soldier, when he was called to account for 
his villany, hen-heartedly took refuge under the strong arm of the 
law, and swore his life against the challenger, would sink me almost 
to a level with yourself. But, detested miscreant, if ever you dare 
approach the throne of heaven, pour out thanksgivings that I am so 
far inferior to you in bodily strength. Were I able to grapple with 
you single-handed, I swear by all my hopes of happiness, the inmost 
recesses of your dungeon-like labyrinth should not screen you from 
my vengeance ! Heavens ! what pride ! what pleasure ! I should 
feel in dragging you reeking from your den, and cow-skinning you 
till Argus himself should not be able to perceive a hair's breadth 
upon your carcase but sore upon sore ; so that were you and Lazarus 
candidates for the commiseration of the public, you would carry off 
the palm. 

A few weeks after the Plumb Pudding he issued the Porcu- 
piniad, a Hudibrastic poem in four cantos. In this a rela- 
tively small number of verses are made the occasion for 
voluminous footnotes^ containing criticisms on Cobbett^ and 
objectionable passage from his works. Many of Carey's writ- 
ings after 1800 were on politics and political economy. The 
Olive Branch, or Faults on both Sides, Federal and Demo- 
cratic, written during the war of 1812^ went through several 
editions. 

It would seem that the author of a passage like the one 
quoted from Carey should be beneath notice in a history of 

literature. The use of billingsgate in political 
Dirty Political controversy was, however, a manner of the 
CMton ^ ^^^ time. Eeaders of all classes learned to expect 

it, and what is worse, to enjoy it; and even 
writers of more refinement than Carey indulged in it on oc- 
casion. Thus William Cliffton (1772-1799), a Philadelphian 
of Quaker descent who wrote some of the most delicate and 
charming verses of the period, was guilty of the Group, a 
dirty and witless satire on the liberal party. In this coarse 
attack he ridicules not only the public life of prominent 



The Eevolutionary Period 151 

Democrats, but their personal appearance and their private 
misfortunes. This disposition toward scurrility in political 
writing, which was seen in a slighter degree in the later work 
of the Hartford Wits, is one of the most unfortunate legacies 
which the eighteenth century left to the nineteenth. 

The last, and except Franklin, the greatest of the Penn- 
sylvania authors who wrote in the period before 1800 was 
Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810). He 
Charles roc - ^^^ j^^^^^ -^ Philadelphia and passed through 

a somewhat peculiar boyhood, during which 
poor health interrupted the studies for which he had a taste, 
and led him to form the habit of taking long solitary rambles 
in the environs of Philadelphia. He studied law, but never 
practiced. Por some time he was in ISTew York, where he met 
a number of literary men and did much of his literary work. 
He early became imbued with religious skepticism, and gen- 
eral freedom of thought, probably from the writings of God- 
win. His first published work of importance was Alcuin, 
a discussion of the rights of woman, in dialogue form, which 
he brought out in 1797. Prom this time until the close of his 
short life he wrote unceasingly. His next work, a novel in the 
form of letters, was never published; but in the four years 
from 1798 to 1801, inclusive, he gave to the world no less than 
six novels, Wieland, Ormond, Arthur Mervyn, Edgar Hunt- 
ley, Clara Howard, and Jane Talbot, besides editing the 
"Monthly Magazine and American Eeview^' in 1799-1800, 
and writing fugitive pieces in prose and verse. Between this 
time and his death he edited the "Literary Magazine and 
American Eegister," a monthly, and the "American Eegister,^^ 
a semi-annual, published other writings, and worked on a 
general geography and a history of Eome during the age of 
the Antonines. He is sometimes spoken of as the first Ameri- 
can who "devoted himself to literature as a profession,^^ and 
the amount and character of the work he did shows what the 



152 American Literature 

phrase meant in his time. His editorial labors and literary 

hack-work are worth notice only as showing what a man 

of letters must then do to live. His novels have a greater 

interest. 

In the art of novel-writing, as in political and religious 

thought. Brown was chiefly influenced by Godwin. His 

^ , „ , stories all have something of the mysterious. 
Brown's Novels 4. -i i .. \ 1 • 11 4. 

the terrible, or the psychologically strange. 

In Wieland it is spontaneous combustion and ventriloquism; 
in Arthur Mervyn the horrors of yellow fever; in Edgar 
Huntley, somnambulism; and the success of his stories lies 
largely in the effective though crude way in which he pictures 
the effect of horror or mystery on the human mind. The 
presence of this uncanny element is, however, one of the great- 
est weaknesses of Brown's works to-day. The taste for crude 
horrors common in the last quarter of the eighteenth century 
was happily only temporary. The art of handling skillfully 
the weird and the mysterious was later developed, especially 
by Poe and Hawthorne, to a point unknown in Brown's time. 
Moreover, the particular devices that he used were unfortu- 
nately chosen. Spontaneous combustion and ventriloquism, 
in his day terms of vague and terrifying suggestiveness, are 
now associated respectively with matter-of-fact science and 
the cheapest charlatanism. It seems absurd to represent the 
human body as consumed by the former, or a rational being 
led to commit a series of awful crimes by means of the latter. 
In the author's time, however, these devices were at least as 
available for literary uses as are hypnotism and various occult 
phenomena for the novelists of to-day. 

In his scenes and settings Brown was true to his experi- 
ences. The action of all his published novels takes place in 
America, and his descriptions are said to be remarkably 
faithful. The wild country described in Edgar Huntley is 
like some of the regions visited by Brown in his youthful 



The Revolutionary Period 153 

rambles. The horrors of the yellow fever epidemic, so vividly 

portrayed in Ormond and Arthur Mervyn, were seen by the 

author in New York. This choice of Ameri- 

Scenes of ^^^ settinsrs is but another expression of 

Brown's Novels . . ^ « . , . , ^ i . , . 

patriotic seli-consciousness ; bnt the realistic 

handling of scenes chosen shows closeness of observation and 

an admirable gift for description. 

In plot. Brown's novels are, according to modern standards, 

almost formless. The sole unity is often that which belongs 

to a series of incidents clustering about one 
B ^ ^ ^' N 1 P^^son. The action, once begun, continues 

through a bewildering series of events, each of 
which is usually told in a long letter or monologue by one of 
the participants. The interest often lies, not in the grand 
denouement, but in the outcome of the separate incidents. 
This interest is, however, rarely lacking. The curiosity 
aroused by one set of circumstances is never gratified until 
some new complication has been introduced. 

The six novels, beginning with Wieland and closing with 
Jane Talbot, not only stand in time at the turn of the 
century, but they combine in an interesting way the charac- 
teristics of the periods that precede and follow. As pioneer 
work they will always be interesting to the student of Amer- 
ican fiction, and they have enough intrinsic merit to justify 
the recent revival of interest in the author and his works. 

Before 1800 America had made a beginning in scholarship. 
The Revolutionary period was given rather to the making 

than the writing of history, and while many 
Histori^s^*"" works were written which are valuable sources 

for the later student, few need mention here. 
The writings of Thomas Hutchinson and of Mercy Warren 
have already been referred to. Jeremy Belknap (1744-1798), 
a native of Boston, sometime pastor of the Congregational 
church at Dover, Massachusetts, and afterward of the Fed- 



154 American" Literature 

eral street church, Boston, came nearer than any contem- 
porary to maintaining the traditions of the earlier New Eng- 
land historians. He published an extended History of New 
Hampshire, and in 1794-8 issued two volumes of American 
Biographies, The first volume begins, somewhat remotely, 
with Biron, Modoc, and Zeno ; the second includes several of 
the early fathers of New England. Belknap should also be 
remembered as one of the founders of the Massachusetts His- 
torical Society. His instincts were scholarly, and his work, 
though now superseded, was carefully done. In his humorous 
prose sketch The Foresters, the adventures of John Codline, 
Walter Carrier, and similar characters represent in allegorical 
form the early history of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and 
the other colonies. 

Among writings which furnish material to the later his- 
torian should be named the Travels of Captain Jonathan Car- 
ver (1733-1780), published in London in 
ffisto?^^^^^ 1778 and later reprinted in America. The 
author, a native of New York, served in the 
French and Indian wars, and at their close started to learn 
something of the new territory that they brought to Great 
Britain. He penetrated as far as Lake Superior and the head- 
waters of the Mississippi, and there, receiving no en- 
couragement from the authorities, was forced to return. He 
then went to England, where he met with slight success in his 
endeavor to secure recognition of his labors, and where he 
died. About one third of his book tells in concise manner the 
story of his journey. The rest is devoted to the manners and 
customs of the Indians, and the flora and fauna of the regions 
that he visited. Both the narrative and the descriptions are 
interesting reading, and more accurate than most books of 
travel in this age. The war produced many narratives of 
personal experiences, especially the experiences of persons 
who were taken prisoners by the British. As a type of these 



The Eevolutionary Period 155 

may be chosen the account written by the picturesque Vermont 
fighter and politician, Ethan Allen (1737-1789). The style 
of this book is rough and ready, and not the least interesting 
parts are those in which the author gives unconscious and not 
always flattering portraits of himself. More dignified and in 
every way better written is the narrative in which Henry 
Laurens (1724-1792), of South Carolina, merchant, states- 
man, and afterward commissioner to negotiate peace, tells of 
his capture and imprisonment in the Tower of London. 

One specimen of historical writing stands in a class by 
itself. Samuel Peters (1735-1826), an Episcopalian clergy- 
man who was expelled from Connecticut as a 
etere s Amus- loyalist, amused himself during his enforced 
sojourn in England by writing a Oeneral His- 
tory of Connecticut, by a Gentleman of the Province. This 
work, published in London in 1781, is famous as the authority 
for the "blue laws,^^ and for many uncomplimentary state- 
ments regarding the colony. It is worthless as history and 
shows the unfairness of the author on every page. A contro- 
versy, not yet settled, arose regarding the author and his 
book, in which it has been maintained that he was prejudiced 
by the harsh treatment that he received, that he intended a 
political satire, that he deliberately lied, and that he was 
insane. Meanwhile the book continues to be amusing, except 
perhaps to ultra-patriotic and ultra-sensitive citizens of Con- 
necticut. 

Natural science received most attention in Philadelphia, 
where Franklin did some of his most important work after 
1765. William Bartram (1739-1823) and B. 
oSShol^^^ ^- Sa^to^ (1766-1815), both professors in the 
University of Pennsylvania, wrote much on 
natural history, the former publishing a detailed account of 
his travels in the South to examine natural products. To 
Connecticut belongs Noah Webster (1758-1843), who pub- 



156 American Literature 

lished his spelling-book in 1783 and his Dissertations on 
the English Language in 1789. His Dictionary belongs 
to the nineteenth century. Lindley Murray (1745-1826) 
was a native of Pennsylvania and for some time a resident of 
New York, though his famous grammar was not written until 
after his removal to England. Two great theologians and 
educators. President John Witherspoon (1722-1794) of 
Princeton, and President Ezra Stiles (1727-1795) of Yale, 
had an important part in the intellectual development of 
America, and their writings entitle them at least to mention 
in a history of American literature. 

As the preceding survey has shown, the troubled years of 
the later eighteenth century brought a change of literary 
ideals, a sense of literary freedom, and earnest 
literary striving, but little valuable achieve- 
ment. The idea that literature should be only the servant of 
religion passed away, even in New England. In its place 
there arose, naturally enough, some disposition to connect 
literature and politics. It was at this time that Americans 
acquired the habit, often remarked by foreign critics, of dis- 
cussing so freely questions of government and of law. In 
political controversy there were developed two prose styles, 
characteristic of the two political parties, Federalist and 
Democratic. The one was a sedate, gentlemanly manner, ow- 
ing something to Addison, and something to later conserva- 
tive writers in England. The other was a slightly heightened 
rhetorical style, seen at its best, perhaps, in the ^^Declaration 
of Independence.^^ In oratory the prevailing fashion at the 
close of the period was the artificial, ^^classicaF' manner of 
Fisher Ames. Dignified verse satire at first followed the man- 
ner of Pope, and burlesque the manner of Butler. Toward 
the close of the century, as has been seen, satire in both prose 
and verse grew bitter and scurrilous. 

Political literature never succeeded, however, in assuming 



The Ee volution ary Period 157 

the same degree of importance that religious literature had 
held in early New England. At the same time that men were 

most concerned over political freedom they 
th^P ^^^j^ ^ were learning to read works which their fathers 

had in many cases abhorred^ and, even in 
the most Puritanical colonies, were themselves attempting 
essays, dramas, lyrics, and fiction. With a few exceptions, 
like the novels of Brown, these attempts were important 
only as beginnings, which were to have an undue in- 
fluence on the work of later Americans. The feeling 
that a national literature could come by deliberate process 
of manufacture, rather than by a slow and natural 
growth, led to much writing that had no real vitality. It 
was hardly fortunate, either, that America did not acknowl- 
edge the eighteenth century English masters until their rule 
was beginning to be questioned at home. Perhaps the most 
hopeful sign was the fact that Americans were eclectic in 
their tastes. The same poet often appreciated and tried to 
imitate the best things in Pope and the best things in writers 
of diametrically opposite tendency. 



CHAPTER III 

The Early Nineteenth Century (1800-1833) 

I. General Conditions ; the Knickerbocker Writers 

At the beginning of the nineteenth century Americans were 
independent politically, but provincial in manners, tastes, and 

habits of thinking. Looking back, we see that 
Rda^nshios ^^^^ ^^^ inevitable. A nation could not find 

distinctive expression in art, literature, and 
social manners as quickly as it could ratify a treaty. Patriotic 
Americans of the time, however, felt that the existence of any 
national deficiency was a matter of shame. Foreign writers 
soon discovered this sensitiveness and took advantage of it. 
English travellers made hasty trips through the United States 
and published their observations ifi accounts which, though 
unjust to the better life of the country and in part false, were 
often painfully true in their pictures of unfortunate national 
traits. English reviewers of American books were likely to 
mingle even with their praise patronizing allusions to the bar- 
renness of literature in the new country. To these aspersions 
American writers replied with absurd denials, bombastic pro- 
tests, satire, and other weapons ineffectual as against the 
truth that the charges contained. The reader of this great 
mass of international writings is forced to the conclusion 
that, though both sides were unfair, England was more just 
to America than America to England. It must be said, how- 
ever, that even reasonably friendly Englishmen rarely neg- 
lected an opportunity to taunt Americans with unpleasant 
facts. This literary antagonism was most intense during the 
early years of the nineteenth century. Its progress and its 

158 



The Early Nineteenth Century 159 

gradual disappearance are among the important facts of the 
period now to be considered. 

The wish to confound foreign critics came as an added 
incentive to the desire to produce a national literature. In 
general, literary attempts were less ludi- 
False Literary crously ambitious than those of the later 
eighteenth century, though the Columbiad, 
perhaps the worst of all, was published in 1807. Among the 
unwise demands which were continually made on American 
authors were those for "sustained effort/^ rapid composition, 
and the treatment of American subjects. The cry for "sus- 
tained effort,^* later ridiculed by Poe, probably came from the 
feeling that nothing but writings on a great scale could ade- 
quately represent a great country. A short essay or lyric, no 
matter how exquisitely wrought, would not be distinctively 
American. The idea of literary inspiration prevailed, and an 
author was praised for the ability to compose a poem at one 
sitting. Painstaking labor was apparently thought unneces- 
sary for a true American genius. The demand for American 
subjects was an unintentional confession of the provincial 
character of American work. Style and tone were almost 
wholly imitative, but it was felt that the subject, at least, 
might be national. 

Almost as marked as provincialism in 1800 was sectional- 
ism. The southern, the middle, and the New England groups 

„ . .. of states were almost as far removed from each 

Sectionalisiu , , . . 

other as in the colonial time. Indeed, western 

expansion and the development of diversified trade interests 

to some extent increased these local differences. To the 

student of literature the most important result of sectional 

rivalry was the temporary depression of New England and 

the rise of New York. 

The causes of the economic and political eclipse of New 

England are too complicated for discussion here. Beginning 



160 • American Literature 

with Jefferson's administration the northern Atlantic states 

were probably the least prosperous section of the country. 

When the depression came the more energetic 

New^Encland J^^^S ^^^ ^i^ ^^^ remain at home to write 
Lamentations, but emigrated to the West, 
carrying with them their sturdiness, their intellectual vigor, 
and their love of education. The influence of these New Eng- 
land emigrants can be traced in the small colleges of western 
New York and Ohio, and to some extent in the public schools 
and state universities of the next group of states to the west- 
ward. No doubt these men had more influence on the intel- 
lectual life of the nation than would have been the case if they 
had stayed at home and written books; but for a time litera- 
ture was deprived of their activities. With so much of the 
young blood gone. New England remained bound by conserva- 
tism, and such able men as were left found large and free 
expression difficult. Moreover, changes in religious belief 
began to occupy attention, and many men like the elder Chan- 
ning, who might have achieved fame in other forms of litera- 
ture, turned to controversial writing. 

On the other hand. New York was rapidly developing. Its 
harbor, its position with reference to the great routes to the 
West, and other minor causes soon made it the 
N ^^ Y k chief commercial center of the country. With 

wealth came leisure and a desire to cultivate art 
and literature. Along with other business interests were devel- 
oped those connected closely and remotely with letters. Great 
publishing houses were founded; and the New York newspapers 
became, as they have since remained, the most prominent in 
the country. All these influences tended to encourage writing 
on the part of native New Yorkers, and to attract men of 
literary tastes and aspirations from other parts of the country. 
Among the former were Irving and Drake ; among the latter, 
Cooper, Bryant, Halleck, and Willis. These men and their 



The Early Nhsteteenth Century 161 

literary associates came to be known as the Knickerbocker 

school or, more accurately, as the Knickerbocker group. Their 

connection was primarily geographical and 

The Knicker- temporary. StilL most of them were acquaint- 
bocker Writers ^ 0,1 i p • j 

ances, and some 01 them were close irienas. 

Naturally they were all influenced to some extent by the con- 
ditions of the time and of the city in which they lived. An 
attempt to connect them very closely will, however, lead to 
misunderstanding. 

The most effective work of these men was done within the 
limits assigned to this period, though neither the opening nor 
the closing date has any especial significance. 
?i^PeS? ^^ '^^^ former, 1800, is chosen mainly for con- 
venience, since the New York writers hardly 
made themselves felt before the publication of Salmagundi 
in 1807 and the Knickerbocker History in 1809. The year 
1833 is arbitrarily assumed as a point of demarcation between 
two periods widely different. Between 1830 and 1835, and 
indefinitely for some years before and after, a spirit of change 
was felt throughout the western civilized world. The political 
revolutions in France, Belgium, and Poland, the passage of 
the Eeform bill, the abolition of slavery and the rise of the 
tractarian movement in England, the development of Tran- 
scendentalism and the welcoming of German influence in 
America, were widely different manifestations of the same or 
related tendencies. This new spirit of the time and the new 
social and political conditions that grew partly out of the 
settlement of the "West and partly out of the increase in com- 
mercial prosperity brought forward new national questions. 
By 1833 the nation was aware of the change; and though most 
of the Knickerbocker group continued to write after that time 
they added little to their fame, and were forced to relinquish 
the lead in literary activity to the younger men who were al- 
ready writing in New England. 



162 American Literature 

The most representative of the Knickerbocker writers and 

the one whose own writings supplied the designation for the 

group was Washington Irving (1783-1859) . He 

Ir^ff ^° ^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ York city^ the son of a well- 
to-do hardware merchant. His father was a 
stern Scotch Presbyterian; his mother was of English an- 
cestry, an Episcopalian, and a woman of gentle and lovable 
qualities. As the youngest of a family in which there were 
several sons, Washington fell mostly under the charge of his 
mother. Some excuse for a lack of vigorous discipline may be 
found in his delicate health. At all events, he seems to have 
done much as he pleased. The elder sons had been graduated 
from Columbia and entered their father's business. Washing- 
ton's desultory schooling ended at the age of sixteen, when he 
nominally began the study of law. Before this time he had 
read much, had made a boyish attempt at writing verses and 
a play, and had acquired a fondness for the theatre, which he 
formed the habit of visiting without his father's consent. It 
was also without the knowledge of his father that he was 
confirmed in the Episcopal church. His law studies were 
pursued with little energy and were often interrupted. He 
made trips up the Hudson, in 1803 he visited Montreal and 
Quebec, and in 1804 he was sent abroad for his health. Some 
time afterward he became engaged to Miss Matilda Hoffman, 
daughter of his law preceptor. The death of this young 
woman in 1809 is often held to mark one of the turning-points 
in his life. Irving was never married. 

Irving's writings are closely associated with the events 
of his life, and fall naturally into five groups; his early at- 
tempts, before he adopted literature as a pro- 
W^£^?^^^ fession*; the Sketch-Book group; the Spanish 
group; the writings on Western American 
themes ; and the later biographies and miscellaneous sketches. 
His first published work was the Jonathan Oldstyle Papers, 



The Early IsTineteenth Century 163 

written for the New York "Morning Chronicle'^ in 1802-3. 
These are plainly imitative of Addison, and the author chose 
for them a name which suggests one of the distinctive quali- 
ties of all his writings. After his return from Europe he was 
associated with his brother William and his friend James K. 
Paulding in the production of Salmagundi, another Addi- 
sonian series published in 1807. These papers discussed the 
theatre, society, and sometimes politics. 

Shortly after the publication of Salmagundi it occurred to 
Washington Irving and another brother, Peter, that there 
would be sport in writing a burlesque on Dr. 
giickerbocker's gamuel Mitchell's Picture of New YorTc, an 
New York historical work that had recently appeared. Ac- 

cordingly they set to work, with energy worthy 
a more serious object, to collect material for erudite footnotes 
and learned references. The work seems to have been fairly 
under way when Peter Irving relinquished his part in the 
undertaking. Washington then altered the plan, which had 
been to continue the history of New York to date, condensed 
the part already written into four introductory chapters, and 
developed the history of the "Dutch dynasty.'^ It was while 
he was engaged on this work that Miss Hoffman died. After 
the first intensity of his grief was passed he returned to it 
as a diversion, and some of the most humorous parts are said 
to have been written after her death. The public had been 
prepared for the book by the publication in N'ew York papers 
of clever advertisements concerning the disappearance of the 
supposed author, Diedrich Knickerbocker. That the hoax 
might be less readily detected Irving took the manuscript to 
Philadelphia, where it was printed in 1809. 

The publication of the Knickerbocker's History of Netu 
York is so important that it is sometimes taken to mark an 
epoch in the history of American literature. It was the first 
American book, with the exception of Franklin's Autohiogra- 



164 American Literature 

pliy, to establish a permanent reputation for literary merit. 
After more than a hundred years it is one of the books with 
which every well-read American is supposed to be familiar. A 
little of its fame is perhaps due to the reflected glory of Irv- 
ing's later works; and a little^ perhaps, to the adoption of 
"Knickerbocker^^ as applicable to everything from New York ; 
but the intrinsic merits of the book entitle it to the place that 
it has held. 

In style the Knickerbocker's History differs greatly from the 
Oldstyle Papers and Salmagundi. The authors by whom 
Irving was influenced are uncertain. Sir 
Characteristics Walter Scott and others made comparisons 
bocker's History "^^^h Swift and Sterne. The question is hardly 
worth considering. The important matter is 
that Irving had evolved a style so far original that it was not 
a plain imitation of any author. Other important character- 
istics of the History can best be seen by comparing it with 
the works of Irving's immediate predecessors, the Hartford 
Wits. From these it differed in the lack of a didactic purpose, 
in its use of humor, and in its attitude toward moral ques- 
tions. A few half-veiled political allusions appealed to con- 
temporary readers, but the work was written not to teach but 
to amuse. The objects of the author's ridicule were chosen, 
not because of any feeling against them, but because they were 
^available for his purpose. Indeed, Irving and his readers both 
feel more kindly toward them because they lend themselves 
to the fun-making. A few of the more serious-minded de- 
scendants of Dutch families at first resented the carica- 
tures of their ancestors, but even these soon felt the geniality 
of the satire and were proud to be called "Knickerbockers.'^ 
Another point of difference between Irving and his predeces- 
sors is his attitude on moral questions. In this he resembled 
old England of the eighteenth century far more than N"ew 
England. The Knickerbocker's History is not in the slightest 



The Early Nineteenth Century 165 

degree immoral ; but it treats flippantly vices which the Puri- 
tan felt he could speak of only with abhorrence. The author 
is evidently a healthy, lively young fellow, not necessarily 
wicked himself, but willing to joke over the sins of others. 

For ten years after the publication of the Knicherbocker's 
History Irving did no literary work except to serve for a 
short time as editor of ^^Select Eeviews/^ after- 
A Period ward the ^^Analectic Magazine.^^ He became a 

Inactivity partner in the firm of Irving Brothers, import- 

ing cutlers, but at first he had little to do with 
the business. He visited Washington, Baltimgre, and Phila- 
delphia, made many friends, and enjoyed the social side of 
life. The war of 1812 threw the affairs of the cutlery firm 
into confusion, and at its close in 1815 Washington Irving 
was sent to England to look after the interests there. He 
seems to have attended to business faithfully, if not with 
enthusiasm. In 1818, however, the firm failed, and he re- 
solved to support himself by writing. Accordingly, he went 
down to London and began work upon the Sketch Booh. 

The Sketch Booh was intended for American readers, and 
was published in New York in parts of four or five sketches 
each, beginning early in the summer of 1819. 
Book^^^*^^ The London ^'Literary Gazette^' began to re- 

print these parts as soon as they were received, 
and in self-defense Irving resolved to bring the work out in 
London himself. After unfortunate experiences with other 
publishers he established, through the friendly mediation of 
Walter Scott, a connection with Murray, the most important 
publisher of the day, that continued throughout his life. 

The chief characteristics of the Shetch Booh are those that 
are found in all the best of Irving's later writings. The style is 
neither that of Salmagundi, nor of Knicherbocher, though 
there are elements of both. Critics have suggested indebted- 
ness to Addison, Steele, Sterne, Mackenzie, Goldsmith, and 



166 American Literature 

others. It is significant that all these authors belong to the 
school just going out of fashion. living's style, though indi- 
vidual, was influenced by the more graceful and sentimental 
writers of the eighteenth century. His subjects were not 
altogether such as the more formal of his masters would have 
chosen. He had a love for the old, the romantic, the pictur- 
esque. He prefixed his sketches with mottoes from old songs 
and old plays, and he rummaged in the British Museum for 
antiquarian information such as he used in the sketches of 
Christmas festivities at an English country-house. He had a 
fondness, too, for the sentimental and the pathetic, as is seen in 
such pieces as ''The Wife,'' ''Eural Funerals,'' "The Widow 
and her Son." Speaking generally, his subjects tend toward 
the romantic, and his style is that of the eighteenth century. 
The Sketch Booh was cordially received in both England 
and America, and the public began to call upon the author for 

« t. ., ^ « something more. The articles in the Sketch 
Bracebridge Hall 

Book that received most praise were the Christ- 
mas sketches and the American stories ''Eip Van Winkle" 
and ''The Legend of Sleepy Hollow;" and in Bracebridge 
Hall, his next volume, Irving continues these two forms of 
writing. The antiquarian learning shown in the descriptions 
of old English customs doubtless represents much preliminary 
work in the British Museum. Most of the book was actually 
written in Paris, where the author spent some time in com- 
pany with Thomas Moore and ot];ier literary friends. In the 
original plan Buckthorne, an author, was to be one of the 
chief characters, but Irving decided to reserve him for the 
hero of the novel which his friends were urging him to write. 
The slight thread of story running through Bracebridge Hall 
is no doubt a concession to this demand for a "sustained" 
work of fiction. The book was ready for the printer early in 
1822, and was brought out simultaneously in England and 
America. A few English reviews objected that the pictures of 



The Early N"in^eteenth Century 167 

country life were untrue, and some of the author^s country- 
men complained that it was un-American, but in general it 
was well received, and further exertions were demanded from 
the author. 

With these demands Irving did not find it easy to comply. 
He tried to make use of Buckthorne in a novel to be called 
The History of an Author; he conceived a 
^ ^ ®^ ^ series of tales on the legendary superstitions 

of Germany ; and he abandoned these in favor 
of two volumes more of Sketch Boole. Finally he decided on 
the form which the Tales of a Traveller now bears. To make 
this somewhat heterogeneous work he cut up what he had al- 
ready written of the History of an Author, and combined 
with the tales so formed material that he might have used in 
the German legends and the new Shetch Book. Much of the 
German material he had gathered in a trip up the Ehine and 
to Vienna and Dresden. He began the manuscript when he 
reached Paris on the return journey, and finished it in Eng- 
land in 1824. Even after it had gone to the printer it was 
found insufficient to fill the specified two volumes, and he was 
obliged to write more sketches and to expand some already 
written. 

Of the three works published between 1819 and 1824 the 
Sketch Book takes highest rank. It is fresher, more spon- 
taneous, and more varied than the others. A 
Compared^ ^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ sketches are almost universally 
known. The popularity of ^^Eip Van Winkle^^ 
may have been increased by the wonderful dramatic inter- 
pretation of Joseph Jefferson ; but the ^^Legend of Sleepy Hol- 
low,^^ in the broader vein of Knickerbocker, is almost equally 
a favorite. Even the English sketches, many of them on 
unpromising subjects and tinged with a sentimentality now 
wholly out of fashion, charm by their clearness and beauty of 
expression. In Bracehridge Hall the style is even smoother, 



168 American Literature 

but somewhat less vital and expressive. There is less narra- 
tive than the plan of the work seems to call for, and the 
many descriptions of persons and scenes, strung on so slight 
a thread of story, become a little monotonous. Only the 
sketch of ^^The Stout Gentleman^^ approaches "Eip Van 
Winkle^^ and ^^The Legend of Sleepy Hollow^^ in popularity. 
The Tales of a Traveller has greater variety than Bracebridge 
Hall, but is inferior in almost every way. Irving was not 
thoroughly familiar with the spirit of the Continental coun- 
tries in which many of his scenes were laid. His acquaintance 
with the cruder forms of German romanticism seems to have 
had a particularly unfortunate effect upon his work. He 
rarely succeeded in a story of action, and in this collection he 
attempted many lively tales. Buckthorne is a less pleasing 
character than most of his literary creations. Moreover, his 
taste seems to have failed him as it rarely did. "The Story 
of the Young Eobber^^ fortunately finds no parallel in his 
other writings. 

Irving's difficulties in preparing the Tales of a Traveller 

doubtless showed him that he had worked out the vein opened 

in the Sketch Booh, If not he must have been 

Irving m Search ^^^j^g^ \^j \]^q reviews, Endish and American. 
of a Subject -^ ^ fc> 

These, while mostly friendly, were not lavish 

in their praises, and many of them made unfavorable com- 
parison with the earlier volumes. So it came about that 
Irving found himself, at the age of forty-two, a literary man 
with an established reputation looking for a remunerative 
literary job. He declined liberal offers of editorships because 
he disliked to be tied down to routine work. He refused to 
contribute to the London "Quarterly Eeview^^ because it was 
unfavorable to America. While still uncertain what to do 
he went over to Bordeaux ^^to see the vintage.^^ Here he 
lingered until he received from Alexander H. Everett, then 
United States minister to Sp^m, the suggestion that he 



The Early ISTineteenth Century 169 

translate Navarette's Voyages of Columbus, soon to appear 
at Madrid. 

On reaching the Spanish capital he found Navarette's 
work too scrappy to suit his purpose^ and he resolved to write 

an independent life of Columbus. Accord- 
Te spams ingly he remained at Madrid^ working on 

manuscripts in the government archives and 
on other original sources. Following a habit of his^ he laid 
aside the Life of Columbus to write the first draft of the Con- 
quest of Oranada, and the former was not finished until 1827 
and not" published until 1828. He now travelled about Spain^ 
visited the Alhambra<, and settled down for about a year at 
Seville. Here he prepared a second edition of the Columbus, 
and put the Conquest of Granada into shape. In 1829 he 
made another visit to the Alhambra^ and it is chiefly the 
experiences of this second trip that are narrated in the work of 
that name. The Legends of the Conquest of Spain are said to 
have been finished at this time, but they were not published 
until later. In 1829 Irving was appointed secretary of lega- 
tion at London. Here he put in shape the Voyages of the 
Companions of Columbus and the Alhambra, 

The Spanish subjects to which Irving was led by the chance 
suggestion of Everett were admirably suited to his taste. 

The two chief characteristics seen in the 

Characteristics STcetch Booh were love of the picturesque and 

of the Spanish o 

Works genume patriotism. Spam could gratify the 

first of these, and Columbus had a connection 
with America. Irving's fitness for writing biography and 
history was, however, not remarkable. He was careful, con- 
scientious, and though desultory in his methods, by no means 
afraid of hard work. He investigated thoroughly many au- 
thorities. But he had neither the training nor the tempera- 
ment of an ideal biographer. Even in the languages that he 
must use he was mostly self-taught. He had an eye for the 



170 American Literature 

picturesque rather than for that which was intrinsically im- 
portant. The result was that in the Life of Columbus he pro- 
duced a work readable, accurate in statement of unquestioned ' 
fact, and as judicial as he knew how to make it, but not, as 
the great biography must be, the final word on the subject. 
In the Conquest of Oranada he made the mistake of trying 
to tell history in the guise of fiction. The work purports to 
be extracts from the chronicle of an imaginary monk. Fray 
Antonio Agapida. Irving intended Fray Antonio to personify 
the churchman^s intense hatred of the Moors, as Carlyle sig- 
nified a certain temper of mind by Dry-as-Dust. The device 
was an unfortunate one. The monk is always felt to be a 
dummy, and his presence tends to discredit the whole work. 
Irving saw this as soon as the book was published. In a re- 
view that, according to the custom of the time, he was asked 
to write for the ^^Quarterly^^ his one object was to maintain 
that the narrative is veritable history. In the AThambra he 
was again free to mingle his observations and the results of 
his imagination without the historian's strict subserviency to 
facts. This collection of descriptions and tales is called with 
some justice a Spanish Sketch Book; but it is somewhat 
thinner and less virile than the earlier work. It seems, too, 
a little more artificial, as if the author had planned some of 
his experiences in the old Moorish palace for the ^^copy'^ that 
might be made of them. With the passing of the popular 
fondness for sentiment it has probably suffered more than the 
Shetch Booh, 

The Alhamhra was published just as Irving returned to 
America in 1832. He had been absent about half a genera- 
tion, during which time he had achieved an 
Writings on international reputation, and his native coun- 
Subjects ^^y h^^ experienced great changes. He had 

always protested his loyalty to America, but 
had said that he found less distraction from work and more 



The Early Nineteenth Century 171 

inspiration in the old world. Although there had been much 
newspaper criticism of his course in remaining abroad, his 
reception on his return was enthusiastic, and there was a 
general demand that he write on American themes. It may 
have been in response to this demand that he took an el- 
tensive trip through the new West, going with a government 
party as far as the Arkansas river, and returning by way of 
Xew Orleans and Washington. The literary result of this 
journey was A Tour on the Prairies, published with other ma- 
terial as the Crayon Miscellany in 1835. 

Even before the Miscellany appeared Irving had received 
from John Jacob Astor a request to write the history of that 
merchant's business ventures on the Pacific 
coast. The circumstances attending the prepa- 
ration of Astoria were once the subject of much controversy, 
now of interest only as showing how jealously the country 
watched its literary men. The unquestioned facts are that 
John Jacob Astor offered to pay Irving for writing the his- 
tory; that at the suggestion of the latter his nephew, Pierre 
M. Irving, was employed on the work at a liberal salary paid 
by Astor; and that the book appeared as Astoria, by Washing- 
ton Irving. It was charged that Pierre M. Irving did most 
of the work, and that Washington Irving sold his name to 
Astor for a large sum. Pierre M. Irving maintains, and there 
is no good reason for doubting his word, that his own labors 
were mostly clerical, and that his uncle received no remunera- 
tion except from the sale of the book in the usual way. 

The third of Irving's writings with a western American 

theme was more purely a commercial venture. While engaged 

on Astoria he met Captain Bonneville, an 

Adventures of adventurer who had spent some time in the 
Captain 

Bonneville West, and had prepared an account of his ex- 

periences. Irving bought his manuscript for 
$1,000, touched it up somewhat — very slightly, if his preface 



172 American Literature 

is to be believed — and issued it in 1837 as The Adventures of 
Captain Bonneville, The speculation was a good one, for 
Nephew Pierre proudly tells us that the sale of the work 
brought $7,500. 

These American works add little to the fame of Irving. 
The subjects were not such as he was best fitted to treat, and 
he was directed to them more by patriotism and popular de- 
mand than by any real interest. The Tour on the Prairies 
and the best parts of Astoria are of the grade of good maga- 
zine work, to be read, enjoyed, and forgotten. 

Irving next planned to continue his studies of Spanish 
achievement in a history of the conquest of Mexico; but he 
procrastinated until he found that Prescott 
B^ ^^ V ^^^ working upon the same subject, and then 

generously relinquished the field to the younger 
man. He began a life of Washington, but it was interrupted 
by his appointment as Minister to Spain in 1842, and by other 
writings. The first volume appeared in 1855, and the last 
just before his death in 1859. Meanwhile he had published a 
short Life of Goldsmith and Mahomet and his Successors, 
both in 1849. Wolferfs Roost, a collection of stories part of 
which had been written for magazines, appeared in 1855. 
Some sweepings of his portfolio were issued after his death 
as Spanish Papers. 

Many of the short sketches in the later volumes were good, 
though none equal the best of his earlier days. Of the later 
biographies, the Goldsmith is the best and the Mahomet the 
poorest. Irving was fitted by temperament to understand 
Groldsmith, and he had neither the temperament nor the train- 
ing for an adequate study of Mahomet. The Life of Wash- 
ington was a respectable treatment of a difficult theme. Irv- 
ing undertook it from motives of patriotism, but it was not 
the kind of subject that he really enjoyed. He complained 
of the ^Vant of f eature^^ even in the Eevolutionary war. The 



The Early Nineteenth Century 173 

present neglect of the work is due, however, not to its lack 
of picturesqueness, but to the fact that it represents a kind 
of biography now out of fashion. In the early years of the 
century the veneration of Washington was carried to ridicu- 
lous extremes. Even conservative magazines printed his name 
only in capitals; and the introduction of the Commander-in- 
Chief, even in disguise, in Cooper^s Spy was condemned as 
sacrilege. Irving belonged to the time when these traditions 
prevailed; and his ancestry, his training, even his name, pre- 
disposed him to take an exalted view of his hero. It should 
be remembered to his credit that, artificial as the Washington 
he pictured seems to us, the portrait is more lifelike than any 
drawn by his predecessors. 

Irving lived until a change in literary taste had taken place. 

Just after his death there was a reaction against his works, 

and a generation fed on Transcendentalism 

General ^ ^ aii(j reform felt that they were thin and 
Characteristics ni ^ ^ a- j.i j j- >i i ^ 

of Irving unproiitable. Since that time there has been 

no enthusiastic Irving revival, yet he has 
slowly increased and seems to be still increasing in popular 
favor. In a study of American literature he is important, if 
for no other reason, because of his historical position. He 
was the first American to win international fame solely as an 
author. He was one of the first Americans to write without 
a didactic purpose. He was the last and the greatest of the 
American Addisonians. The intrinsic merit of his writings, 
however, warrants his fame. This merit is of stjde rather 
than of content, though the two are inseparable. And in style 
his writings are surprisingly uniform. Unlike Charles Brock- 
den Brown and many other men who have depended on 
authorship for support, he did not divide his time between 
hackwork and more purely literary efforts. Virtually every- 
thing that he wrote appears in his collected works ; and there 
are few pages of which he need have felt ashamed or which 



174 American Literature 

the reader with leisure will not find fairly interesting. Still, 
his fame has come to rest mainly on the KnicheriocTcer 
History, the three works of the STcetch Booh group, and the 
more imaginative of the Spanish writings; and in these may 
be seen his chief excellences. The adjective most frequently 
applied by contemporaries to both the man and his writings 
was ^^genial.^^ With geniality were combined a certain old- 
fashioned quality and a masculine delicacy of taste. It is 
easy to enumerate many things that he could not do, yet he 
appeals as do few other American authors to the reader who 
is in the proper mood. \ 

The second of the greater Knickerbockers was James Fen- 
imore Cooper (1789-1851). He was born at Burlington, 

New Jersey, but before he was a year old 
James ^jg father removed to Cooperstown, New York, 

Cooper ^ settlement founded on a large family estate 

in the wilderness. There was Quaker blood 
in his father's family, and his mother was of Swedish descent. 
His boyhood was spent among the heterogeneous population of 
a backwoods settlement. Here he attended the village school, 
dignified by the name of ^^The Academy,^' and then continued 
his studies under a clergyman near Albany. In 1802, at the 
age of thirteen, he entered Yale college. According to his 
own statement he studied little, and in his junior year was 
dismissed for his share in some college scrape. It was then 
decided that he should enter the navy. As there was at this 
time no naval academy it was necessary for him to serve an 
apprenticeship in the merchant marine, and he shipped as a 
common sailor on a vessel bound for England and Mediter- 
ranean ports. In 1808 he was commissioned as midshipman, 
and was detailed with a party sent to supervise the construc- 
tion of a brig on Lake Ontario — an experience that he later 
made use of in writing The Pathfinder, He also saw some 
sea duty. In 1811 he married Miss DeLancey, of Westchester 



The Early ISTineteenth Century 175 

county, New York; and as his wife objected to the separa- 
tion involved in a naval career he resigned from the service. 
For some years he lived at various places in New York state, 
with no other occupation than managing his property. 

It was in 1820, when Cooper was past thirty years of age, 
that he chanced to remark that he could write a better story 

than some fashionable novel which he was read- 
F^tN^ 1 ^^S* According to tradition, his wife dared 

him to make good the boast. As he had never 
written anything, or taken any interest in literature, it is un- 
likely that she expected him to do so. But he set to work, 
and before the close of the year had completed Precaution, a 
novel of English society life, with much pious moralizing. 
It seems dull now, but it was a fair representative of a type 
then in fashion, and was good enough to be reprinted in Eng- 
land, and to receive favorable notice from some reviewers who 
took it to be the work of an English woman. This would seem 
to indicate that it was superficially true to conventional ideas, 
if not to life, in its portrayal of English society. The author 
had seen England only as a sailor with a few days of shore 
leave in London, and it is a mystery where he obtained his 
ideas of English affairs. Very likely he had absorbed them 
from novels of the same sort that he attempted. 

The success of Precaution was not great, but it was enough 
to encourage another attempt. The author's friends of course 

urged him to try an American subject. Prob- 
T^^ p?^ ably the example of the author of Waverly in- 

The Pilot clined him to the historical novel. He took as 

the germ of his next story, The Spy, some anec- 
dotes that he had heard from John Jay regarding an Ameri- 
can secret service agent in the Eevolutionary war. The scene 
is laid in Westchester county, with which he had become 
thoroughly familiar after his marriage. He worked with little 
enthusiasm, the writing dragged, and it is said that, in order 



176 American Literatuke 

to satisfy his printer that the work would really have an end, 
he wrote the last chapters and had them printed and paged 
before he completed the earlier parts of the second volume. 
Late in 1821, however. The Spy appeared, and met with a sale 
imprecedented in American fiction. This seems to have de- 
termined Cooper on more systematic authorship, though in 
the preface to his next work. The Pioneers, he expressed him- 
self as still undecided. He removed to New York city, where he 
was in closer touch with publishers, and where he founded the 
Bread and Cheese Lunch, a club of which most of the other 
Knickerbocker writers were members. In The Pioneers he 
portrayed the frontier life that he had seen in boyhood. Be- 
fore this appeared he had decided upon another work under 
circumstances slightly similar to those which led to Precau- 
tion. In a discussion of the identity of the ^^Great Unknown'^ 
he had maintained that The Pirate was written by a lands- 
man, and that a sailor would have achieved greater effects 
with the same material. One of his hearers was incredulous, 
and to show what could be made of a sea tale he decided to 
write one himself. The Pilot followed closely upon The Pio- 
neers, both of them appearing in 1823. 

Within less than four years after Cooper blundered, so to 
speak, into authorship, he had produced four novels of four 

distinct types — the novel of fashionable society, 
Variety of ^j^^ historical novel of the Eevolution, the 

^Qflj novel of frontier life, and the sea tale. The 

first of these was relatively a failure; but in 
all the others he had succeeded, and The Spy, The Pioneers, 
and The Pilot are still among his most popular works. The 
historical novel appealed to him most strongly — both The 
Spy and The Pilot are to a certain extent of this class — and 
he decided on a series of tales based on Eevolutionary happen- 
ings in various states. The only one written was Lionel Lin- 
coin, for Massachusetts. This represents much careful study. 



The Early N'hsteteenth Century 177 

but the author could never do justice to New England, and it 
fell flat. He then returned to the frontier tale and wrote 
what many consider his masterpiece — The Last of the 
Mohicans. 

In 1826 Cooper went abroad and remained for seven years, 
visiting most of the countries that a traveller ordinarily sees, 
but spending more time in France than else- 
Writings where. His travels did not interfere with his 
Produced 
Abroad writing. In the first two years of his foreign 

residence he produced The Prairie and The 
Bed Rover, which continue the frontier stories and the sea 
tales respectively. The Wept of Wish-ton-Wish and The 
Water-Witch, published in the next two years, were less suc- 
cessful. Before they appeared Cooper was being drawn into 
the controversies, that occupied much of his later life. He 
was irritated by the ignorance and misconceptions of Euro- 
peans, and particularly of Englishmen, regarding America. 
At the same time he felt that Americans lacked much of the 
refinement of the old world and were too self-satisfied. With 
a view to correcting the ideas of both parties he had written 
in 1828 Notions of the Americans Picked up hy a Travelling 
Bachelor, a series of imaginary letters by an imaginary Eng- 
lish traveller in America. He had a knack of antagonizing both 
sides in any controversy that he entered, and this book was 
not especially pleasing to either Englishmen or Americans. 
The course of European events, including the revolution in 
France and the revolt in Poland, now attracted his attention, 
and his next three novels, The Bravo, The Heidenmauer, and 
The Headsman, have European settings. This does not imply 
a diminution of the author's Americanism, for all the stories 
exalt the idea of democracy. 

In 1833 he returned to America and settled at Cooperstown. 
For almost all the remaining eighteen years of his life he was 
engaged in quarrels. The history of these troubles occupies 



178 American Literature 

much space in a complete biography of Cooper, but it is 
hardly worth the reader^s time. The unpopularity caused by 

what he had written while abroad was in- 
o^oversies creased by A Letter to his Countrymen, a 

pamphlet in which he grew indignant at some 
of the criticisms on his novels, expressed contempt for the 
American press, and touched on politics in a way to anger 
both parties. The Monihins, a poor attempt [at a satirical 
novel, had the same effect. In 1836-38 he published ten 
volumes of travels in which he pointed out the faults of Europe 
and America in a way that was pleasing to neither. Mean- 
while he had trouble with his neighbors over the right of the 
public to use part of the Cooper estate as a picnic ground. 
The quarrel was trivial, but it was taken up by the press of the 
country to Cooper's disadvantage; and it led to two novels. 
Homeward Bound and Home as Found, which state Cooper's 
side of the matter, and contain much criticism of America. 
By this time he had come to be looked upon as an unreasonable 
grumbler, and a slanderer of his country, and was everyw^hero 
assailed. In 1839 he brought out his History of the Navy of 
the United States, a work which he had long had in mind. 
Two rival officers were claiming credit for the battle of Lake 
Erie, and as Cooper's judgment was not wholly in favor of 
either, the partisans of both added their clamors to those of 
his other enemies. Cooper had already begun suits for libel 
against newspapers in various parts of the country, and these 
were increased in number and continued for several years. 
He was successful in almost all, and it seems to be the verdict 
of a later generation that his worst offense was a lack of tact, 
and that his traducers were wholly unjustified. 

It is strange that in 1840 and 1841, in the midst of these 
disquieting experiences, Cooper produced two of his calmest 
and most successful stories. The Pathfinder and The Deer- 
slayer. Most of his other late novels have a controversial 



The Early Nineteenth Century 179 

or at least a strong didactic element. Of these^ Mercedes of 
Castile, which appeared between The Pathfinder and The 

Deerslayer, is a story of the voyages of Colum- 
Novds '^ ^^^^'^ bus. The Two Admirals, Wing-and-Wing, 

Ned Meyers, and Afloat and Ashore deal 
with the sea. Wyandotte is a frontier story. Satanstoe, The 
Chainhearer, and The EedsTcins form a series called forth by 
Cooper's interest in the anti-rent war, waged by tenants 
against the patroon system in N"ew York. The Crater, Jach 
Tier, The Oah Openings, The Sea-Lions, and The Ways of the 
Hour, which appeared between 1847 and 1850, show an in- 
crease in didacticism and a decrease in creative imagination. 
It is said that the author contemplated a tale in which his 
favorite hero, Leatherstocking, should take part in the Eevo- 
Intion, but if the design existed its execution was prevented 
by his death. 

If popularity be accepted as a test only two novels written 
after 1828, The Pathfinder and The Deerslayer, deserve to 

rank with those of earlier date. Of the other 
oo^rs es ^^^^^ works, some of the sea stories are still 

read, though usually by persons who have 
enjoyed The Pilot and The Bed Rover, and who hope for 
something more of the same kind. The writings on which 
the author's reputation now rests are The Spy, The Pilot, The 
Red Rover, and the five frontier stories in which the character 
of Leatherstocking appears — The Pioneers, The Last of the 
Mohicans, The Prairie, The Pathfinder, and The Deerslayer,"^ 



* This is the order in which the "Leatherstocking Tales" were written. Arranged 
according to the events of the hero's life they would stand: The Deerslayer » The 
Pathfinder, The Last of the Mohicans, The Pioneers, and The Prairie. Cooper began 
by picturing an old hunter such as the proprietor of Cooperstown doubtless found 
when he began his settlement. In later volumes he represents different epochs 
in the life of such a character. The Deerslayer pictures the young hunter just 
showing his aptness for woodcraft; The Pathfinder shows the lover; The Last of 
the Mohicans the woodsman in his prime; and The Prairie the old man, driven 
from his favorite hunting grounds in the forest by the advancing settlements. 



180 American Literature 

Special praise for the other stories is not hard to find. Ban- 
croft pronounced the description of the battle of Bunker 
Hill in Lionel Lincoln the best ever written ; Bryant admired 
the spirit and lifelike quality of JacTc Tier; and only the other 
day a much-travelled English woman said that The Bravo 
was still the best guidebook to Venice. None of these works, 
however, appeals as a whole to the ordinary reader, and the 
novel of adventure that does not so appeal is a failure. 

In judging of the unsuccessful novels and miscellaneous 
works the reader is hampered by an imperfect knowledge of 
the author's personality. It was Cooper's dy- 
ooper s j^g ^-g-j^ ^j^^ ^^ authorized biography be per- 

mitted, and his family have never opened to 
the public any of the special sources of information in their 
possession. Cooper was a man with few close friends, and his 
manner, both in writing and in personal intercourse, was such 
as often to be misunderstood. It is unfortunate that posterity 
has not the fullest opportunity to do him justice. Certain 
characteristics are, however, fairly apparent. He was by con- 
viction and hereditary instinct an aristocrat, yet he was by 
political conviction a democrat. In religion he combined a 
love of the forms of Episcopalianism with almost Puritan 
ideas of conduct; so that it has been said that he hated the 
Puritans because he was so much like them. His many 
troubles seem to have been brought about by a lack of tact and 
a mistaken idea that it is always the duty of a friend to tell 
unpleasant truths. His strictures on America were not made, 
as was charged, because he was unpatriotic, but because he 
really wished that America might know her faults and mend 
them. 

These personal peculiarities explain much that was weak 
and unfortunate and ephemeral in Cooper's work. The en- 
during qualities of his better stories are associated with his 
genuine love of what is best in America, and his wholesome, 



The Early Nineteenth Century 181 

large-hearted appreciation of nature and those types of men 
that are nearest nature. The scenes of all his best stories are 
laid in America or on board American ships, and his best 
characters are all Americans. His pictures of the forest, 
the lake and the sea have a wonderful freedom and life. One 
of the best indications of their merits is the fact that his long 
descriptions do not seem intolerable in an exciting story. 
The action rarely appears to drag except in those unfortu- 
nate novels where the author lectures and preaches. 

An unfriendly critic can easily formulate a long series of 
charges against Cooper. He fails in psychological analysis 

of the more complex types of man. He can- 
Cooper's -QQ^ portray a gentleman, or a N ew Englander, 
Excellences ^^ ^ woman. He has little command of humor. 

His plots are not carefully constructed and 
if coolly analyzed often seem improbable in detail. He over- 
works a few devices, such as the ^^broken twig'^ which Mark 
Twain ridicules, and the abstracted manner of his naval 
heroes. His language is often inexact and he sometimes 
makes downright grammatical blunders. 

The wise admirer of Cooper will concede the truth of most 
of these charges, but will maintain that they are not sufficient 

to justify the condemnation of his works. If 
Cooper's j^^ cannot portray the intricate workings of a 

Venial complex mind, he has chosen as his heroes 

men of simple life and elemental passions. 
Harvey Birch, Leatherstocking, and Tom CofBn, however 
unsatisfactory to a devotee of realism, have impressed thou- 
sands of readers as true to life. Even the imbecility of his 
women, of which much has been said, is not a fatal defect. 
The fashion of his time was that heroes should be of the male 
sex; and the weakness of those dependent upon them empha- 
sized their manly qualities by contrast. That he could por- 
tray at least one type of strong-minded woman is shown by 



182 American Literature 

Betty Flanagan in The Spy. Moreover, Cooper's lacka- 
daisical heroines are not unlike those oi other novelists of his 
time, and the student of the period hesitates to say that they 
are wholly untrue to life. It was as much the fashion for 
women to be helpless and clinging then as it is for them to 
be athletic now; and in literature for and about women, and 
in personal letters that have been preserved, is evidence of 
the existence of a race of beings very similar to the ^^f emales'^ 
of The Pilot and The Last of the Mohicans. 

Cooper's lack of humor is a defect, but it is not noticed 
except when he attempts an unsuccessful comic character like 
the music master in The Last of the Mohicans, or the tailor 
and his wife in The Red Rover. The plots, whatever their de- 
fects, do not fail to hold interest, and in the outcome to sat- 
isfy a sense of poetic justice. Inconsistencies may be striking 
when they are pointed out, but the man who cares for a story 
of adventure rarely notices them as he reads. The defects 
of style are explained, though of course not excused, by the 
author's lack of early training and his haste in composition. 
They are not so serious as is often supposed, and the language 
often has ease of movement and genuine power. 

Final judgment on the value of Cooper's works could be 
passed only after deciding the relative merits of different 
schools of fiction. Without discussing this 
oopers ea question, one may fairly say that the narra- 
tion of heroic deeds has been popular from 
the days of Homer to those of Stevenson, and is likely to be 
popular longer still. Critics who feel that the tale of ad- 
venture gratifies only a crude taste will of course give Cooper 
little consideration. Those who insist on a certain precon- 
ceived standard of literary expression may find some things 
in his novels which they will not enjoy. Those, however, who 
require of such fiction only that it be absorbingly interesting, 
and that it contain nothing to shock the moral or esthetic 



The Early Nineteenth Century 183 

sense, will be likely to rank him high. In the past there have 
been many of the last-mentioned class. Some of the men 
who were most hostile to the author personally were enthusi- 
astic admirers of his works. His better novels have been 
translated not once but many times into most European 
languages^ and it is said into those of the East. So far as 
can be judged their popularity is no less now than it was 
fifty years ago^ and this in spite of the fact that in the 
meantime all literary tendencies have pointed in a different 
direction. 

Whatever judgment is passed on his literary merits^ it must 
be remembered that Cooper created the American novel of 
the sea, and practically created the American 
O*^' t^d^^^ frontier story and the American historical 
novel. In his choice of literary form he was 
influenced by Scott; but once started he was in no sense an 
imitator. His American predecessors taught him nothing. 
That it was not easy to grow the flowers even after he had 
furnished the seed is shown by the fate of dozens of frontier 
stories written as soon as he had popularized the type. With 
the exception of those by Simms, hardly one is remembered by 
name. In his field Cooper was the pioneer and he still 
stands alone. 

William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878), the third of the more 
important Knickerbocker writers, was one of the many New 
England men who were attracted to New 
Brv nt^ ^ ^^ York. He was born in Cummington, Massa- 
chusetts, where his father was a physician and 
a man of some importance in the community. In his early 
years his maternal grandfather, an old Puritan of the strict- 
est school, had a considerable hand in family discipline; and 
Bryant mentions the impression made upon him by "prayers 
which were poems from beginning to end, mostly made up of 
sentences from the Old Testament writers.^^ A little later 



184 American Literature 

the father, while in Boston as a member of the legislature, was 
attracted by Unitarianism and the son afterward followed 
his lead; but the impressions made by this early training 
remained. 

After receiving his elementary education Bryant studied 
Latin and Greek under two clergymen, one of whom, it is 
interesting to note, gave him instruction and board for a 
dollar a week. At the age of sixteen he was prepared to en- 
roll as a sophomore in Williams college, then a struggling 
institution with but four instructors. His father was unable 
to give him a college education, and after one year he left 
Williams to take up the study of law. In time he was ad- 
mitted to the bar and became a moderately successful country 
practitioner at Great Barrington, Massachusetts. 

From an early age Bryant had been a great reader. His 
father's library contained the eighteenth century English 

classics in prose and verse, and the works of 
ryan s ar y ^^^ earlier American poets. Before he went to 

college he had read a large and surprisingly 
heterogeneous list of books. At twelve he was enthusiastic 
over Pope's Homer, and he always retained a kindly feeling 
for Pope, though he differed from him widely in poetic ideals. 
Later, he had a Scott period, which resulted in some attempts 
at narrative poems on Indian subjects, and a Byron period 
of which he was afterward ashamed. Shortly after leaving 
college he was interested in the gloomy sentimentalists like 
Blair and Henry Kirke White. His favorite poet, however, 
from the time that he first saw the Lyrical Ballads, was 
Wordsworth. His versification, especially his blank verse, 
shows most influence of Wordsworth, with some qualities 
derived from his early familiarity with Pope. It is notice- 
able that though his earliest attempts were in the heroic coup- 
let, he soon dropped that measure altogether, and it is found 
in no poem in his collected works. Still, his fondness for a 



The Early Nineteenth Century 185 

marked rhythmical beat is seen in a few peculiarities of his 
versification. With the eighteenth century writers of blank 
verse he has little in common. 

Bryant himself tells us that in his very early childhood he 
used to pray that he might write verses that should endure. 

When thirteen years of age he wrote a political 
V W 't* ff satire, "The Embargo/^ which was published, 

and republished with affidavits certifying to 
the precocity of the author. While at Williams college he 
began a narrative poem on an Indian subject. When seven- 
teen or eighteen years of age, and while under the influence 
of Henry Kirke White and others of his school, he wrote the 
greater part of "Thanatopsis,'^ but the poem was not published 
until 1817. "To a Waterfowl'^ was written at the age of 
nineteen. In 1821 he was invited to deliver the annual poem 
before the Phi Beta Kappa society of Harvard. It is an indi- 
cation of the state of poetry at the time that this honor went 
to a country boy who had attended college but one year, and 
whose reputation rested on a few poems in the magazines. 
His performance on this occasion was "The Ages.^^ In the 
same year he published his first collection of poems, a volume 
of only forty-four pages, containing "Thanatopsis,^^ "To a 
Waterfowl,^' "The Ages,'' "The Yellow Violet/' and a few 
others. During the next few years he wrote a large number 
of his shorter poems. 

All this time Bryant had been practicing law in western 
Massachusetts, and his affiliations had been with Boston rather 

than with New York. The law had always 
New York ^ been somewhat distasteful to him, and in 1835 

he gave up his practice and went to New York 
as editor of the "New York Eeview and Athenaeum Maga- 
zine.'' This periodical soon failed, and after some vicissitudes 
he accepted an editorship on the "Evening Post." In 1828 
he became editor in chief. In 1834 he went to Europe for 



186 American Literature 

two years and on his return assumed both the business and 
the editorial responsibility of the ^Tost/^ From this time 
until his death he led the active life of a New York newspaper 
man, relieving the monotony of his work by frequent trips 
abroad, by the purchase and improvement of a country place 
on Long Island and of the Bryant homestead at Cummington, 
and by literary diversions. 

On his arrival in New York in 1825 he established personal 
relations with most of the literary men of the city, and with 
several of the young enthusiasts who wei'e try- 
Bryant and - jj^g -j-() develop the fine arts in America. He 
Knickerbockers came too late, however, to be much influenced 
by these men, or to exert much influence on 
them. In 1825 he was thirty-one years of age, the head of a 
family, and a man of considerable business and professional 
experience. Many of his poems, including the two usually 
named as his best, were already.written. The other Knicker- 
bockers had also done much of their best work and were not 
likely to be changed by a new-comer. Such influence as 
Bryant did exert was, however, of a kind much needed. In 
a time when rapidity of composition was prized before other 
excellences he stood for care and revision. Though never a 
deep student, he endeavoured to take a broad view of literary 
matters, and his criticisms were more judicial than those of 
most of his contemporaries. 

For half a century the great bulk of Bryant's writings was 
composed of editorial articles. These hardly rank as litera- 
ture, and few of them have been reprinted. 
Bryant's L^j^g most of his work they are careful and 

Articles sedate, though not lacking in strength. In 

style they differ widely from the breezy edi- 
torials that have more recently characterized the "Post,'' yet 
they appealed to the same high class of readers. As an editor 
Bryant was especially interested in the improvement of news- 



The Early Nineteenth Century 187 

paper English, and his rules for the printers of the "Post^^ 
are still traditions in many composing rooms. 

The two volumes of prose in Bryant's collected works in- 
clude tales and sketches, lectures, magazine articles on litera- 
ture and art, and memorial addresses. Many 

Sf/^^,!'^ of the lighter articles first appeared in the 

Miscellaneous ,,,^ ,. „ ,. . , . 

PjQse "Talisman,^^ a literary annual issued m 1827, 

1828, and 1829 by Bryant, Verplanck, and 
Sands, and illustrated by Inman, S. F. B. Morse, and other 
artist friends of the editors. Bryant could not tell a story and 
he soon gave up the attempt. Some of the magazine articles 
show his interest in literary subjects and his appreciation of 
scholarly methods. An early paper ^^On Trisyllabic feet in 
Iambic Measure,^' though dealing with the mere rudiments of 
versification, shows research in a field that had hardly been 
touched in America. Some lectures on English poetry are ab- 
surdly inclusive, but indicate careful work. The memorial 
addresses dajte from the later years of his life. They invari- 
ably contain over-praise, but except for this are admirable. 

Excellent as was Bryant's work as editor and critic, it is 
to his verse alone that he owes his position among American 

authors. Yet his verse writing was always 
Bryant s incidental to his regular duties. All his poetry 

except his translation of Homer is collected 
in one small volume. Of this over one-fourth was written 
before he came to New York in 1825, and the rest was scat- 
tered over the fifty-three remaining years of his life. After 
he went to New York he studied several modern languages, 
and the result of this study and of his first visit to Europe 
was a number of translations of short poems. The influence 
of Irving on American taste is seen in the fact that over one- 
half of these are from the Spanish. The translation of Homer 
was taken up as a diversion after the death of his wife in 1866. 
The ^'Iliad'^ was published in 1870, the ^^Odysse/' in 1872. 



188 American Literature 

In the poems certain limitations are at once apparent. The 
author could not tell a story, though he succeeded slightly 
better in verse than in prose. He had, if one may judge by 
his writings, no sense of humor. Few things in literature are 
more painful than the lines ^^To a Mosquito/^ and ^^A Medi- 
tation on Ehode Island Coal.^^ He lacked passion, fire, definite 
human sympathy. 

Bryant^s excellences are best seen in poems that present 
two favorite ideas. The first of these is that of 

"eternal change 
Which is the life of Nature." 

He loves to stand apart, watching with a remote sympathy 
the continual flux of things. This is seen in 
ryants ^The Crowded Street,^^ and on a larger scale 

in ^^The Ages,^^ "The Past,'' and the "Hymn 
to the North Star.'' The poems on death consider this most 
momentous change that comes to man as part of the great 
movement of nature. It is death in its relation to the body 
rather than to the soul that he treats, but as he approaches the 
subject it is never repulsive. As death is universal, so it is 
to be viewed calmly and bravely; this is the teaching first 
stated in "Thanatopsis," and many times repeated. The other 
favorite idea of the poems is love of nature. Bryant's feel- 
ing toward nature was that of a healthy man who enjoyed it 
for its own sake, without asking why. He does not philoso- 
phize over it like Wordsworth, or describe it microscopically 
like Tennyson, or sentimentalize over it like Burns. If he 
uses it to point a moral it is by the obvious device of a com- 
parison, as in "The West Wind," "The Hymn to the North 
Star," "A Summer Eamble," and "To the Fringed Gentian." 
Of all aspects of nature he enjoyed best the wild forest as he 
knew it in boyhood in western Massachusetts. The Italian 
landscape did not satisfy him because man had changed 



The Early Nineteenth Century 189 

nature too much. He says little of the mountains, and little 
of the sea, though for the last thirty-five years of his life he 
over-looked it from his country home. His poems to particu- 
lar flowers treat common favorites without previous poetical 
associations, such as the yellow violet, the painted cup, and 
the fringed gentian. His melancholy shows itself in his 
poems on autumn, and the peculiar coldness of his tempera- 
ment is seen in his fondness for winter. One of his best love- 
songs has a winter setting, and ^^The Little People of the 
Snow,^^ the best of his narrative poems, is a unique story of 
the fairies of the cold who revel among the frost-flowers. 
Naturally, the best of his poems are those that connect both 
of his favorite ideas — the love of nature and the thought 
of death as change. These ideas are sometimes strangely 
combined, as in ^^June,^^ where the beautiful month appeals 
to the author as a pleasant time in which to be buried. 

The poems that deal with subjects other than those just 
mentioned are likely to be good, but not remarkable. The 
author^s taste did not often fail him except 
r^s a ion -^^hen he attempted humor, and he rarely 

wrote anything that was flat. Even the Homer 
is a work of some merit. When he began the translation 
nearly sixty years had elapsed since he received his scanty 
college training in Greek, and he could have given little 
time to 'the language afterward. He was the coldest of 
poets. He is said to have held with Poe that a long poem 
is an impossibility; and, as has been remarked, he did not 
succeed well in telling a story. Such a man could not make a 
very scholarly or a very popular translation of the most glow- 
ing and rapid of epic poets. His version has, however, dig- 
nity, and often ease, and is probably more nearly literal than 
any other verse translation. 

Although Bryant often shows quiet melancholy, he can 
hardly be accused of sentimentality. Most of the poems that 



190 American Literature 

approach nearest to sentimentalising like "Consumption'^ and 
"The Death of the Flowers/^ have a personal reference. Di- 
dacticism seemed natural to him, yet he rarely wrote with a 
didactic purpose. The moral is almost always given at the 
end of a poem, in a few lines that though skillfully added 
might often be omitted without much loss. Indeed, the clos- 
ing lines of "Thanatopsis'^ were not written until some years 
after the rest of the poem had been published ; and the same 
might conceivably be true of "The West Wind/^ the "Hymn 
to the North Star/^ "^A Forest Hymn/^ and many others, 
among them even "To a Waterfowl.^^ 

Bryant was the first American poet to attain lasting fame, 
as Irving was the first essayist, and Cooper the first novelist. 
Unlike these men, he did not achieve an in- 
ternational reputation. The volume of poems 
issued in 1832 was reprinted in England through the instru- 
mentality of Irving, but it attracted little attention, and its 
author never became widely known abroad. He was, how- 
ever, for at least twenty-five years, the leading poet of America, 
and for a much longer time he had no rival in his own sec- 
tion of the country. This fact gave him a prestige which may 
have influence on his reputation, even to-day. But though he 
has perhaps been overrated he fully deserves a place among 
the greater American poets. No American has equalled him 
in the expression of his few favorite ideas; and these, while 
they are not of the sort to arouse enthusiasm, appeal strongly 
to most persons at some period of their lives. Though his 
manner is cold, his diction is always clear and his verse 
flawless; and occasionally, as in the line which so impressed 
Hartley Coleridge and Matthew Arnold, 

"The desert and inimitable air," 
there is a touch of inspiration. He is the least of the trio 
of the greater Knickerbockers, but he may live longest of 
them all. 



The Early Nineteenth Century 191 

The lesser New York writers are all far inferior to the 
three already discussed, yet several of them produced single 
works that are still well known; and they 
Y k W^r showed forth fully as much as their superiors 

the characteristics of national life. Most of 
them were so versatile, or rather attempted so many things, 
that no classification according to forms of composition is 
practicable. 

Among the writers who link this period to the preceding 

is William Dunlap, whose dramas have already been noticed. 

«r.«. ^ , After 1800 his literary activities were mostly 
William Dunlap ., , i.- + • ;i i.- i. tt 

those of an historian and a biographer. He 

wrote the lives of George Frederick Cooke, the actor, and 
Charles Brockden Brown, a History of the American 
Theatre and a History of the Rise and Progress of the 
Arts of Design in the United States. All these are full of 
facts, but are formless and without merit of style. Dun- 
lap was, however, a forceful and influential man among 
literary men, the friend of most of the newer authors, as he 
had been the friend of Charles Brockden Brown. The His- 
tory of the American Theatre is dedicated to Cooper. 

James Kirke Paulding (1778-1860), already mentioned as 
a collaborator with Irving in Salmagundi, was a peculiar 
specimen of Americanism. His family origi- 
PaS^E ^ nally had some property, but his father ex- 
pended it by an act of patriotism during 
the Eevolution, and was never reimbursed. The son was 
born in Dutchess County, New York, and grew up with 
little schooling and without going five miles from home until 
he was eighteen or nineteen years of age. He then secured a 
business clerkship in New York, where his sister had married 
William Irving. The Irvings introduced the green country 
boy to their literary friends, who at first took him up as the 
butt of their jokes. In time he became more sophisticated 



193 American Literature 

and was able to do his full share in Salmagundi. This seems 
to have been his first attempt at authorship. In 1812 he 
brought out John Bull and Brother Jonathan, a political 
satire modeled on Arbuthnot, and he continued writing until 
1849. The Lay of the Scottish Fiddle is a parody on Scott. 
The Backwoodsman is a poem descriptive of frontier life. 
Koningsmarhe, the Long Finne, The Dutchman's Fire- 
side, and Westward Ho are novels. Among his other works 
:are a play, The Lion of the West, a second series of Salma- 
gundi, and Merry Tales of the three Wise Men of Gotham — 
the last a heterogeneous satire on the theory of human per- 
fectibility, the common law, and phrenology. The author's 
temper was satiric, and even his novels were "complicated^^ — 
to use his own phrase — by irreverent burlesques of other 
authors. He seems always to have retained the attitude of 
the countryman in the city, who feels that he must ridicule 
everything he sees in order not to be ridiculed himself. When 
not engaged in political satire Paulding preferred to write 
of American frontier and country life. The scene of The 
Dutchman's Fireside is laid near Albany before the Eevolu- 
tion, that of Koningsmarhe in New Jersey, and that of 
Westward Ho in Virginia and Kentucky. The author has 
Cooper's fondness for the woods and the wilderness, but little 
of Cooper's power of description. In some of his lighter 
sketches he is like a crude and clumsy Irving, and might be 
suspected of imitation if he had not shown the same quali- 
ties before the Sketch Book was published. 

Among the lesser poets of New York two stand out with 
especial prominence. Of these, the younger, Joseph Eodman 
Drake (1795-1820), did not live to fulfill his 
josep oaman ^^pjy promise. He is said to have been a 
descendant of the Pilgrims, but was born in 
New York. Both his parents died when he was young and 
he was forced to support himself. He first engaged in busi- 



The Early Nineteenth Century 193 

ness, then studied medicine, and afterward kept a drug store 
and practiced his profession. He married a woman of some 
means and was able to go abroad for his health, but it was use- 
less, and he died of consumption at the age of twenty-five. 
His lesser poems show the influence of Moore and occa- 
sionally of Wordsworth. His one important work is ^^The 
Culprit Fay/^ a narrative and descriptive poem in which he 
tried to acclimate fairies to the region of the Hudson. The 
story is that of a fay who has sinned by loving a mortal 
maiden and must do penance. Some of the situations are 
ingenious rather than imaginative, but there is music in the 
verse, and there are some truly poetic descriptions. It was the 
best work of the kind that had so far been done in America, 
with the possible exception of one or two poems by Freneau. 
Unfortunately Drake was anxious for the praise that was 
being bestowed so freely on rapid work, and he prefixed to 
"The Culprit Fay^^ an ingenious note so worded as to give 
the impression, without stating the fact, that the poem was 
written in three days. 

Fitzgreene Halleck (1790-1867), the close friend and lit- 
erary partner of Drake, was one of the New Englanders who 

were attracted by the commercial prosperity 
H «^^^^ of New York. He was born in Connecticut, 

where he taught school and clerked in a store 
until he was twenty-one years of age. He then secured a po- 
sition in a New York counting-house, and held this and a 
similar clerkship with John Jacob Astor during his active 
career. Shortly after he went to New York he met Drake. 
According to tradition the latter was captivated by Halleck's 
aflEected remark that it ^Vould be heaven to lounge upon the 
rainbow and read Tom Campbell,^^ and the two became at once 
fast friends. In 1819 they united to write the^^Croaker Papers,'^ 
a series of light and often satirical verses on topics of the 
time, published anonymously in the "Evening Post.^^ Some 



194 American Literature 

of the papers are clever, but the great stir they made must 
have been due to the novelty of the plan and to the fact that 
the secret of authorship was so well kept. 

As time went on Halleck assumed the air of a blase bache- 
lor, and became a well-known figure in literary and social 
circles. His verse was influenced chiefly by 
p ^ ^ Campbell, and later by Byron. Among the tricks 

that he acquired from the latter was that of 
mixing in the same poem serious imaginative passages and bur- 
lesque. This is seen in ^Tanny,^^ ^^ Alnwick Castle,^^ ^Tonnecti- 
cut/^ and other poems. His longest poem, ^^Fanny,^^ published 
in 1819, is often called an imitation of Don Juan, but the dates 
are so close together as to make this doubtful. In this, and 
in some poems of the Alnwick Castle volume of 1827, are 
fine passages which earned for the author a temporary repu- 
tation as one of the few greater American poets. In later 
years he wrote little. Though probably second only to Bryant 
of the Knickerbocker poets, he is now remembered for little 
more than ^^Marco Bozzaris,^^ and one stanza of his tribute 

to Drake: 

Green be the turf above thee, 

Friend of my better days ! 
None knew thee but to love thee, 

Nor named thee but to praise. 

The names of three New York writers are preserved each 
by a single song. John Howard Payne (1792-1852), author 

of "Home, Sweet Home,^^ was born in New 
Sone-Writers York city, but spent part of his boyhood in 

Boston. He early showed an interest in the 
theatre, which his Puritan relatives tried in vain to suppress. 
He edited a dramatic paper at the age of thirteen and at 
eighteen went on the stage. During much of his life he was 
connected with the theatre in Europe and America, sometimes 
as actor, but more frequently as author and adapter of plays. 



The Early Nineteenth Century 195 

For some time he resided in Paris and translated successful 
French plays for the London managers. His best drama, 
Brutus, or the Fall of Tarquin, was not a direct adaptation, 
though he owns his indebtedness to other authors who had 
written on the same theme. It is a blank-verse tragedy with 
some striking situations, and was long in the repertoires of 
the greatest tragedians of England and America. ^^Home, 
Sweet Home^^ occurs in Clari, or the Maid of Milan, a senti- 
mental production which is remarkable for nothing else. 
Payne died at Tunis, where he was United States consul, 
and after many years his body was brought back for interment 
in his native country. Samuel Woodworth (1785-1843), 
born in Massachusetts and long a New York editor, wrote 
plays, a novel, and many short poems, most of them senti- 
mental. The only one that survives is "The Old Oaken 
Bucket,^' written in 1817. George P. Morris (1802-1864) 
was born in Philadelphia, but lived almost his entire life in 
New York. His editorial career, extending from 1823 to 
1864, was divided between the "New York Mirror'^ and the 
"Home JournaV^ both light literary journals which reflect 
in an interesting way the transient taste of the country. 
Morris was long noted as the most successful American writer 
of songs. Of these only "Woodman, Spare that Tree^^ is now 
sung. Others, such as "Near the Lake where drooped the 
Willow,^' "We were Boys together,'' and "My Mother's Bible," 
are said to have been immensely popular in their day. Payne, 
Woodworth, and Morris all show the influence of the wave 
of sentimentalism that was sweeping over both England and 
America about 1820-1830. 

Among the less important Knickerbocker writers were 
Gulian C. Verplanck (1786-1870) and Robert C. Sands 
(1799-1832), who have been mentioned as collaborators with 
Bryant in the "Talisman." Verplanck was a descendant of one 
of the wealthy old Dutch families of New York, and was long 



196 American Literature 

prominent in social, literary, and political life. His contribu- 
tions to the ^^Talisman/^ which are typical of his lighter 

work, include popular historical sketches, a 
YorkVri^rs romantic tale or two, and a humorous skit, 

^Teregrinations of Petrus Mudd/^ In his 
serious work he is much heavier than Irving, but aims 
to produce the same effects. His humor, which he employed 
in several political satires, approaches burlesque. Verplanck 
was the author of serious essays and orations on literary mat- 
ters and edited the works of Shakespeare. He was the kind 
of man who gives weight and character to a literary set, but 
his own writings are now of little value. Eobert C. Sands had 
a part in several literary undertakings besides the ^^Talisman'^ 
during his short life of thirty-three years. While a student 
at Columbia college he formed a sort of literary partnership 
with James W. Eastburn (1797-1819), a young divinity 
student of much promise who died at a still earlier age than 
Sands. Together they started two periodicals, and later 
began a metrical translation of the Psalms and Yamoyden, 
a narrative poem with an Indian hero. The latter was fin- 
ished by Sands after his friend's death. Later Sands did 
editorial work on several periodicals and contributed, with 
Miss Sedgwick and others, to the Tales of Glauber Spa, 
His prose, much of which dates from the later years of his 
life, is somewhat Irvingesque. His verse is notable for the 
wide range of influence that it shows in both spirit and form. 
An early poem, ^^The Bridal of Vaumond," is in the measure 
of ^^The Lay of the Last MinstreV but has a Byronic motive. 
The introduction to Yamoyden is in the Spenserian stanza, 
and the body of the poem, which is in octosyllabics, contains 
echoes of Milton's minor poems, Scott, Shelley, Coleridge, and 
Wordsworth. Sands was also familiar with the poets of 
Southern Europe and made several translations from their 
works. 



The Early Nineteenth Century 197 



IT. Writers of ISTew England 

During the supremacy of the Knickerbocker school in 
American literature the most popular, though not the ablest 

group of New England writers, were the suc- 
Connecticut cessors of the Hartford Wits in Connecticut. 

These continued the milder traditions of their 
predecessors, but lacked their fire and enthusiasm. They 
were especially susceptible to the sentimental influence seen 
in the works of the lesser New York poets, and their work was 
almost all obviously moral and didactic. The most promi- 
nent of the group were Mrs. Sigourney, Percival, and Good- 
rich. 

Lydia Huntley Sigourney (1791-1865) was probably the 
most representative of the Connecticut writers. Before her 

marriage she taught ^^select'^ classes of young 

y la un ey j^dies : she was a model wife and mother ; and 
Sigourney ^ ^ 

after her husband lost his property she con- 
tributed by her pen to the support of the family. Her biog- 
rapher tells with pride that she composed or aided in the com- 
position of forty-six volumes, ^^besides more than 2,000 
articles in prose and verse, contributed to nearly 300 periodi- 
cals.'^ Her first volume, aptly called Moral Pieces in Prose 
and Verse, published over her maiden name in 1815, was 
composed largely of exercises written for her class of young 
ladies. Other representative titles of her books are Olive 
Buds, Letters to Mothers, Whisper to a Bride. Her first 
collection of poems appeared in 1827, and others followed 
at short intervals. Many of these volumes were issued 
as gift books, with fine paper, delicate binding, and the char- 
acteristic steel engravings of ninety years ago. Mrs. Sig- 
ourney was early styled ^The American Mrs. Hemans,'' and 
the characterization was fully as happy as most such nick- 
names. She dealt especially with the simpler domestic affec- 



198 American Literature 

tions, with the beauty of piety, and the necessity of preparing 
for death. Her average mediocre work may be illustrated by 
a stanza from ^^The Bubble^^ : 

Out springs the bubble dazzling bright. 
With ever-changing hues of light, 
And so amid the flowery grass, 
Our gilded years of childhood pass. 

James Gates Percival (1795-1856) was known to his con- 
temporaries as one of the greatest American poets^ but is 
now almost forgotten. There is space here 
Percival ^ ^^ neither to trace the details of his shifting 
career nor to discuss his complex personality. 
He was born in Connecticut, and was graduated at Yale 
in 1815. He studied now law, now medicine, taught 
school in various places, thought of taking holy orders, gave 
popular lectures on botany, published a miscellany at Charles- 
ton, South Carolina, was appointed professor of chemistry 
at West Point, resigned because of fancied slights to his dig- 
nity, did philological work on Webster's dictionary and was 
state geologist in Connecticut and in Wisconsin. Meanwhile 
he had time for several unfortunate love affairs, an attempt 
at suicide, and the production of a large amount of verse. 
Among his personal traits seem to have been an acute sensi- 
tiveness and an extreme though genuine egotism. These 
peculiarities interfered with his success in life, and made it 
possible for an essay by Lowell, which is essentially unfair, to 
shatter whatever remained of his literary reputation. 

PercivaFs versatility shows itself in his poems. These 
include attempts in almost all conceivable metres, and trans- 
lations from most known tongues, besides 
PoemT ^ verses in foreign languages. Notwithstanding 

Lowell's patronizing sneer, Percival had great 
linguistic attainments and, although he was influenced by 
some of the bad fashions of his day, considerable taste. He 



The Early Nineteenth Century 199 

held, however, the belief that poetry came by inspiration, not 
by labor, and he never revised. As a result, many fine lines 
and passages that show genuine poetic feeling and in- 
sight are buried amid masses of crude Byronic and other imi- 
tative verse. Some of his sonnets and one or two lyrics, such 
as "The Coral Grove^^ and "To Seneca Lake,^^ are sufficiently 
free from blemishes to hold a deserved place in the an- 
thologies. A little search among his works will reveal many 
beauties, and some touches of real genius, but there are few 
poems that are worthy of consideration in their entirety. He 
was one of the most notable victims of the belief in inspira- 
tion and hasty composition. 

Samuel G. Goodrich (1793-1860) was by birth and tempera- 
ment a Connecticut Yankee, though after a time he removed 

his publishing business from Hartford to 
Samuel G. Boston. As publisher, and as editor of his 

literary annual "The Token," he aided in in- 
troducing to the public several literary men, notably Haw- 
thorne. He was himself the author of the original Peter 
Parley books, though later works issued under this name were 
written by others. The Peter Parley books aimed to instruct 
the young in history, geography, and many other subjects by 
introducing edifying facts in a fictitious narrative. This 
sugar-coating of knowledge was clumsily done, but the plan 
just suited the temper of the time, and the series had a great 
sale, both in America and in England. 

To the list of Connecticut poets may be added the name of 
James A. Hillhouse (1789-1841), of New Haven, a Yale 

graduate of the class of 1808. His first publi- 
Minor ^ cation, a Phi Beta Kappa poem entitled "The 

Writers ^^^ Judgment, a Vision,^^ is commonplace, and 

suffers by comparison with Wigglesworth^s 
"Day of Doom.'^ "Hadad,^^ a drama, is his most ambitious 
work. The theme is the old one, based on a story in the Apoc- 



200 American Literature 

rypha, of a maiden with a demon lover. The plot is crude, 
and the verse is often turgid with crowded and mixed imagery, 
but there are occasional passages of strangely powerful blank 
verse. J. G. C. Brainard (1796-1828) was another Connecti- 
cut poet. He was a born journalist, with a journalist's facility 
of expression, and the defects that arose from hurried compo- 
sition are less obvious in his work than in that of Percival, 
though his genius was very much less than PercivaPs. His 
friend Goodrich tells with much enjoyment that his once 
famous lines on Niagara were composed in a few minutes 
with the printers calling for copy, though the subject was 
entirely unpremeditated, and the author had never seen the 
Falls. His friends felt that he gave promise of great attain- 
ment, but he died of consumption at the age of thirty-two. 

Literary traditions in Boston during the early years of the 
nineteenth century were conserved chiefly by a group of young 

professional men, most of whom were mem- 
Boston Writers: bers of a social and literary association known 
Qub^*^^^^^ as the Anthology Club. From 1803 to 1811 

they published the ^^Monthly Anthology,^^ and 
they were the chief contributors to the "North American 
Eeview^' when it was founded in 1815. The first editor of 
the "North American Eeview^^ was William Tudor, and among 
his associates were John Quincy Adams, Jared Sparks, Joseph 
Story, William Ellery Channing, George Ticknor, Edward 
Everett, Alexander H. Everett, Eichard Henry Dana, Wash- 
ington AUston, J. S. J. Gardiner, E. T. Channing, and others. 
The names of many of these men are remembered, though 
in some cases not solely because of the excellence of their 
literary work. Only two or three need be considered here. 

William Ellery Channing (1780-1842) takes rank rather 
as a divine than as a man of letters, yet he had more of the 
literary gift than most of his contemporaries. Several ad- 
mirable reviews and miscellaneous essays dating from the 



The Early Nineteenth Century 201 

time of the Anthology Club show what he might have achieved 
if he had devoted himself to pure literature. Even at this 

early time^ however, his chief interest was in 
William EUery theological and religious questions. A little 

later he found himself, though against his 
will, the recognized leader of the liberal forces in the great 
controversy between the Unitarians and the orthodox Congre- 
gationalists ; and still later he was involved in the anti- 
slavery agitation. His religious and sociological writings 
show the clearness of his thought and the lucidity and charm 
of his style, but the fact that they deal with unattractive 
subjects, and that they are chiefly claimed and circulated by 
a single sect, prevents them from being widely read. 

The ablest writer of this group, with the possible exception 
of Channing, was Eichard Henry Dana (1787-1879). He 

was a native of Cambridge, and entered Har- 

D^r^ ^"""^^ ^^^^ ^^^^ *^^ ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^' ^^* ^^^ dismissed 
on account of some offence, and studied law. 

His connection with the Anthology Club dates from 1814, 
and he was for a time associated with Edward T. Channing in 
the editorship of the "North American Eeview.^^ When 
Channing resigned Dana failed of promotion to the editor- 
ship because he was too unpopular. Indeed, certain, personal 
peculiarities interfered not only with the smoothness of his 
personal relations with other men, but to some extent with the 
excellence of his writings. He was given to discussing him- 
self and his works with great self-complacency, and he had too 
little deference for well-established literary canons. Besides 
reviews and miscellaneous essays he wrote poems and prose 
tales. Some of these he published in "The Idle Man,^^ a 
miscellany which he issued in 1821-2. In the more powerful 
stories, such as "Paul Felton^^ and "Tom Thornton,^^ he shows 
the influence, though no direct imitation, of Charles Brockden 
Brown. Though these exhibit some lapses in taste, they are 



202 American Literature 

better in their way than anything else of the kind between 

Brown and Poe. 

Verse-making seems to have been a late diversion for Dana. 

His first poem, ^^The Dying Eaven/^ was published in ^The 

^ , ^ New York Eeview^^ in 1825, when the author 

Dana s Poems 

was thirty-eight years of age. Once started, 

he wrote freely, and in 1827 issued a volume of poems which 
won some praise from ^^Blackwood^s.^^ Another volume ap- 
peared in 1833. Dana's longest poem, ^^The Buccaneer/' in 
which a cruel pirate suffers for his misdeeds through the 
agency of a spectral horse, is grotesque in conception, but 
contains many good passages, as well as many examples of 
pathos suggestive of Crabbe. The author had a genuine ap- 
preciation of nature, and his best verse is that in which this 
is shown. "The Little Beach-Bird'' is probably his best 
known poem. 

Washington AUston (1779-1843), one of the greatest of 
early American painters, was a native of South Carolina, but 
removed to Ehode Island in early boyhood. He 
wasnmgton ^^^ graduated from Harvard, and studied art 
abroad until 1809, when he opened a studio 
in Boston. By his first marriage he was connected with the 
Channings and by his second with the Danas, and was thus 
thrown into close association with the Anthology set. In 
1813 he published in London The Sylphs of the Seasons and 
other Poems, and by 1822 he had written Monaldi, a romance, 
which was not, however, printed until nearly twenty years 
later. He had the eye and the ear of an artist, and his serious 
poems show delicate beauties, but no great strength. Occa- 
sionally, as in "Eosalie," his metrical effects suggest those of 
Poe's lighter melodies. In "The Paint King" he attempts a 
burlesque on Scott. Monaldi is a melodramatic story of 
revenge and insanity, with a conventional Italian setting. 
The best passages in the book are one or two short descriptions 



The Early Nineteenth Century 203 

of nature. At the time when AUston was writing, America 
needed the artist influence, and his fine personality as well as 
his talent enabled him to do his contemporaries much good; 
but his work is not of the sort to live for its own merits. 

Two members of the Anthology Club, George Ticknor 
(1791-1871) and Edward Everett (1794-1865), should be 

remembered as among the first Americans to 
George Ticknor gtndy at German universities and to introduce 
Everett ^^ Harvard college those German methods 

that revolutionized higher education in 
America. Ticknor served as professor of foreign languages 
at Harvard, again studied abroad, and in 1849 published a 
scholarly history of Spanish literature. Everett during his 
long and busy career was at different times pastor of the Brat- 
tle street church in Boston, professor of Greek at Harvard, 
president of Harvard, member of Congress and of the senate, 
minister to England, secretary of state, and candidate for the 
vice-presidency. He was prolific of both magazine articles and 
orations, his collected works containing about one hundred and 
seventy-five of the latter. In his day he was frequently named 
as the greatest American orator. His addresses, though he says 
he has ^^applied the pruning knife freely to the style,^^ are 
even in their amended form the best illustration of the high- 
flown manner which was the fashion in the early years of the 
nineteenth century. They abound in classical allusions, and 
are modelled, as the author apologetically says, on Johnson, 
Gibbon, and Burke. 

John Quincy Adams (1767-1848), who has been mentioned 
as a member of the Anthology Club in Boston, is known rather 

as a statesman than as a literary man, though 

51^^^^ 1. XX ]^st before he was elected to the presidency 
Massachusetts r ./ 

Writers of the United States he filled the chair of 

lelles lettres at Harvard. Joseph Story (1779- 

1845), another member of the Anthology Club, was a 



204 American Literature 

graduate of Harvard with the class of 1798. He wrote verses 
in his earlier years^ and was later a politician^ a judge, a pro- 
fessor in the Harvard law school, and the author of many 
able treatises on law. A contemporary of these men, though 
not exactly of their set, was Charles Sprague (1791-1875), 
a native of Boston and for nearly half a century a banker in 
that city. He wrote prize prologues for various theatres, and 
a didactic poem, ^^Curiosity,^^ which he delivered before the 
Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard. This piece, which is 
often spoken of as his best, is the usual metrical essay in the 
heroic couplet, with obvious echoes of Pope. As a whole it 
is smooth, but lacks striking or quotable passages. Sprague 
was an orator of the florid type. A sounding passage on ^The 
American Indian,^^ from his Fourth of July oration delivered 
in 1825, was a favorite school declamation until comparatively 
recent years. Another old-fashioned poet was John Pierpont 
(1785-1866), a native of Connecticut and a graduate of Yale, 
for many years pastor of the Hollis Street Church, Boston. 
He was a great traveller for his day, visiting the Holy Land. 
He was also an ardent temperance and antislavery reformer, 
and some of his enthusiasms are reflected in his verse. The 
Airs of Palestine w^^ published in 1816 and reissued with some 
additions in 1840. The best known of his occasional poems 
is ^^Warren's Address,^^ written for the banquet at the laying 
of the cornerstone of the Bunker Hill monument, and begin- 
ning ^^Stand ! the ground^s your own, my braves.^^ Lucius 
M. Sargent (1786-1867) was another Boston poet and re- 
former. His chief interests were in the temperance move- 
ment. Some of his temperance tales, which to a later taste 
seem wofuUy commonplace, were widely read, and it is said 
that one of them passed through one hundred and thirty 
editions. Henry Coggswell Knight (1788-1835), a native 
of Massachusetts and a graduate of Brown University with 
the class of 1812, published in 1809 The Cypriad, a coUec- 



The Early Nineteenth Century 205 

tion of youthful verses, in 1815 The Broken Harp^ and 1821 
Poems, His work is a strange mixture, occasionally poetic, 
sometimes witty, but often flat and unintentionally ludicrous. 
As a versifier he echoes every poet that he reads, and his work 
is perhaps most notable for the fact that at an early date he 
shows so strongly the influence of Wordsworth and Coleridge. 
His Letters from the South, published over the signature of 
Arthur Singleton, are studiously whimsical. 

New Englanders were especially susceptible to the pious and 
didactic sentimentality which was prevalent during the early 
nineteenth century, and several Boston women 
Sentimentality yj^^j ^i^]^ -|-]^g Connecticut authors in show- 
Writers i^g this quality. Their works are now of value 
only as an expression of the spirit of the time. 
Sarah Wentworth Morton (1759-1846), who as early as 1790 
had published Oudbi, an Indian tale, in verse, brought out in 
1823 a miscellany entitled My Mind and its Thoughts, Some 
of the prose ^"^thoughts^^ are sufficiently ^^Orphic^^ in form to 
suggest the later transcendentalists. The verse is in the 
form of ^^Odes^^ and ^^Lines^^ to Time, Memory, and other 
abstractions. Hannah P. Gould (1789-1865), the daughter 
of the principal of the Boston Latin school, wrote much 
for periodicals, and published several volumes of verse. Her 
poems are all short, and bear such suggestive titles as ^^The 
Empty Bird^s Nest,'' 'The Slave Mother,'' "To the Moon- 
beams," 'The Pebble and the Acorn." The early work of 
Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880) also shows much senti- 
mentality and is obviously didactic. Holomok, her first 
novel, was published in 1821. The Rebels followed the next 
year. Both have historical American settings. More repre- 
sentative are some early writings for children. In 1831 she 
became interested in the antislavery movement through the 
influence of Garrison, and from that time she devoted her- 
self to this and kindred reforms. 



206 American Literature 

Marie Gowen Brooks (1795-1845), whom Southey named 
^^Maria del Occidente/^ and characterized . as ^^the most im- 
passioned and imaginative of all poetesses/^ 
Br^oks^''^^'' had a varied career. Her father died when 
she was a child, leaving her almost penniless. 
She was educated by Mr. Brooks, a wealthy Boston merchant, 
who married her, but soon afterward lost his property, and 
then died. The young widow, who had taken to writing 
verses ^^for consolation,^^ went to Cuba, and afterward to 
England. Her first volume, Judith, Esther and other Poems, 
was published in 1820. The first canto of Zophiel, or The 
Bride of Seven, was written in Cuba, and the rest under 
Southey^s direction in England. Idomen, which appeared in 
1843, was autobiographical. Mrs. Brooks^s earliest verses were 
echoes of the English poets, especially those of the seven- 
teenth century. Zophiel, an Eastern tale, reminds us of the 
brief popularity that Byron, Moore, and others gave to oriental 
subjects. It tells again the story of a maiden whose suitors 
were slain one after another by her demon lover. The versi- 
fication is harsh, though many passages show the impassioned 
quality which Southey praised. 

Catherine M. Sedgwick (1789-1867), a prolific writer of 
fiction and miscellaneous works, was a somewhat more sane 
and important authoress. She was born in 
Catherine M. Stockbridge and, like other residents of 
western Massachusetts, had some associations 
with the New York literary set. In 1832 she contributed with 
Bryant and others to a miscellany, The Tales of Glauber 
Spa, For fifty years she conducted a school for young ladies ; 
and her novels, Hope Leslie, The Linwoods, and others, have 
the moral and educational qualities to be expected in the work 
of a preceptress, though they are by no means so weak as the 
usual ^^moral tales.'' Her patriotism was especially intense. 
The Linwoods, her latest and probably her best novel, is a tale 



The Early Nineteenth Century 207 

of the Eevolutionary war. In this she ventured to introduce 
Washington among the characters, though she confesses in the 
preface that when mentioning his name ^^she has felt a senti- 
ment resembling the awe of the pious Israelite when he ap- 
proached the ark of the Lord/^ The plot is :a complicated 
one, involving all the fortunes of both love and war, and 
ends with strict poetical justice done to all parties. 

As was seen in the last chapter, the tendency to write broad 
burlesque and vituperative satire culminated about the be- 
ginning of the century, and the Hartford Wits 
Satire— Thomas and Mathew Carey did some of their most 
Fessenden offensive work just after 1800. As time went 

on the less dignified and more objectionable 
writings of this sort came to be recognized at their true value, 
and though they continued to be written and published they 
need not be noticed here. The satires of Thomas Green 
Fessenden (1771-1837) are still faintly remembered. Fes- 
senden was born in New Hampshire, took his degree at Dart- 
mouth, and went to England on a business enterprise. Here 
he became interested in Perkins's metallic tractors, a cure-all 
extensively advertised, and in 1803 attacked physicians who 
opposed their use in Terrible Tradoration, by Christopher 
Caustic, M.D. This is in four-line stanzas of Hudibrastic verse, 
and is accompanied by voluminous footnotes, in some of which 
there is great show of scientific knowledge. The verse itself 
seems far from brilliant, but the public, which always enjoys 
an attack on doctors or preachers, welcomed the poem, and 
it was generally read and quoted in England and America. 
In 1806, after his return from England, Fessenden published 
Democracy Unveiled, a violent attack on the Democrats, whom 
he designates as 

The scum — the scandal of the age, 
A blot on human nature's page. 

He is especially severe on Jefferson, and a relatively small 



208 American Literature 

number of Hudibrastic verses serve as an excuse for footnotes 
in which are repeated the worst of the charges against Jef- 
ferson^s public and private character. Later, Fessenden pub- 
lished Pills, Poetical, Political, and Philosophical, A satirist 
of a different sort was Tabitha Tenney (1762-1837)^ a native 
of Exeter, New Hampshire, who published Female Quixotism 
in 1807. In this work Don Quixote and Sancho Panza are 
burlesqued in the heroine and her maid, whose adventures [are 
varied and some of them rather boisterous. 

One of the most picturesque of New England literary char- 
acters was John Neal (1793-1876), who was born in Port- 
land, Maine. His Wandering Recollections of 
N^af^ ^ 5omei(;/^af busy Life, written when he was 

about seventy-five years of age, recounts in' 
a breezy manner the varied experiences of an indefatigable 
Yankee. At different times he was in business, as clerk and 
proprietor in several cities, teacher of penmanship, lawyer, 
editor, and man of letters. His first story, Keep Cool, in ridi- 
cule of duelling, was published in 1817, and his poem, ^^The 
Battle of Niagara,^^ in 1818. These were followed in the next 
fifteen years by seven other novels and some miscellaneous 
work. Meanwhile he had gone to England, and with the 
assurance of a self-educated down-easter had made himself 
known to literary men, and become a contributor to ^^Black- 
wood's^^ and a protege of Jeremy Bentham. After five years 
he returned to America, to resume the practice of law and 
continue literary work. Neal exemplifies in an exaggerated 
degree most of the amusing characteristics that have been 
noticed in his contemporaries. He showed his patriotic wisli 
for literary independence by rejoicing that he did not write 
"what the English themselves call English.^^ In his review 
of American Literature in "Blackwood^s^^ he complacently 
wrote of his own poems : "Abounding throughout in absurdity, 
intemperance, affectation, extravagance — ^with continual but 



The Early Nineteenth Century 209 

involuntary imitation : yet^ nevertheless, containing altogether 
more sincere poetry, more exalted, original, pure poetry, than 
all the works of all the other authors that have ever appeared 
in America/^ He published the dates at which he began and 
ended each of his novels, and called attention to the rapidity 
of composition — ^^four English volumes in thirty-six days/^ 
Most of his works are turgid and bombastic, others show 
traces of sentimentality. Yet, in spite of his ridiculous ex- 
travagance of thought and expression, Neal is far more than 
an epitome of the faults of American authors. There is much 
imagination and grace in some of his poems, and even the 
hastily written novels often hold the attention by their origi- 
nality of conception and vividness of portrayal. All in all, 
Neal and his works are among the most interesting literary 
curiosities of the time. 

III. Writers of Philadelphia; the South; the West 

At the opening of the century Philadelphia was tlie chief 
city of the country, and a centre for much of what was called 
^^polite letters ;^^ but among the great number 
Joseph^Dennie ^^ creditable writers there were few whose 
works are now even faintly remembered. For 
the first decade of the century the most prominent literary 
figure was perhaps Joseph Dennie (1768-1812). He was a 
native of Boston and a graduate of Harvard, and before he 
removed to Philadelphia in a political capacity in 1799 had 
been a newspaper editor in New England. From 1801 until 
his death he conducted the ^Tortfolio^^ under the name of 
''Oliver Oldschool/' This journal contained letters of travel, 
literary and dramatic criticism, original and selected poetry, 
[and miscellaneous essays, after the manner of the better 
eighteenth century magazines. In dress, deportment, and 
literary style Dennie affected the fashions implied by his 
pen-name. His prose was formal and a trifle oracular, and 



310 American Literature 

his tastes were in general those of the eighteenth century, 
though in an early number of the ^Tortfolio^^ he quoted from 
the Lyrical Ballads and gave them high praise. As ^^The Lay 
Preacher^^ he began in his New Hampshire newspaper and 
continued in the ^Tortfolio^^ a series of ^^sermons^^ — short 
essays each prefixed with a text of Scripture. 

Charles Jared Ingersoll (1782-1862), a Pennsylvania law- 
yer and politician, wrote poems, a tragedy, a history of the 

War of 1812, and his Recollections ; but was 
ar es jare ^^^^ known for IncJiiquin the Jesuit's Letters. 

These were published in 1810 at a time when 
America was greatly irritated by the unfavorable accounts 
written by foreign travellers in the United States, and 
pretended to give the observations and criticisms of a Jesuit 
in this country. They were written as if from Washington 
and vicinity, and contain slight censure and much praise of 
American customs and institutions. The pretense of foreign 
authorship ought not to have deceived anyone, and the great 
interest that the letters aroused can be accounted for only by 
the excited state of public feeling. 

John Blair Linn (1777-1804) was a native of Pennsylvania, 
but like his more famous brother-in-law, Charles Brockden 

Brown, lived for some time in New York. 
Minor ^ When but eighteen years of age he published 

Writers ^^ ^^^ latter city a volume of Miscellaneous 

Worlcs that show promise, and two years later 
wrote a play, Bourville Castle, which was acted with much 
success. He afterward underwent a change of feeling and 
became a clergyman, and was settled as pastor of the First 
Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia. Valerian, a narrative 
poem with some strong descriptive passages, was published 
after his death. Joseph Hopkinson (1770-1842), a Phila- 
delphia lawyer, owes his place in literary history only to 
the authorship of ^^Hail, Columbia/^ 



The Early Nineteenth Century 211 

The South continued to furnish orators and statesmen, but 
produced no writers who gave themselves exclusively to litera- 
ture, and it was only occasionally that a pro- 
^^J^^^ fessional man attempted literary composition 

Kennedy ^^ ^ diversion. The only city that could be 

called a literary center was Baltimore, and 
Maryland had a larger share of authors than any other 
Southern state. John Pendleton Kennedy (1795-1870) was 
a Maryland lawyer who during much of his life was active 
in politics. His first literary work was contributions to the 
^^Eed Book/^ a fortnightly publication which he and a friend 
issued at Baltimore in 1818-19. Swallow Barn, published in 
1833, is a series of sketches of life in lower Virginia, with a 
slight tale interwoven. Horseshoe Robinson, probably the 
author's most popular work, is a tale of the Eevolution. Rob 
of the Bowl is also an historical novel, with the scene laid 
in the times of the proprietary government in Maryland. In 
all these works the description of life and manners is faithful 
and picturesque, and the story is interestingly told. 

William Wirt (1772-1834) was also a native of Maryland, 
but spent most of his life in Virginia and at Washington. He 
was a lawyer, and held many political posi- 
WiUiam"wirt ^ions, but found time for much literary work. 
His first series of essays, the Letters of the Brit- 
ish Spy, adopts the old fiction of a packet of letters found in 
a boardinghouse, and purports to be written from Eichmond 
by an Englishman of rank to a member of parliament. The 
character of the supposed author is not well maintained, and 
the letters are really essays dealing with the nature of elo- 
quence, Buffon's theories of geological formation, the need 
of greater support for higher education in Virginia, and other 
of the author's faf orite topics. After their publication in the 
Eichmond "Argus'' in 1803 the letters were collected in book 
form and went through at least twelve editions. The sketch 



212 American Literature 

of "The Blind Preacher'^ in Letter VI was long a favorite 
selection. The author shows the influence of Addison, whom 
he praises extravagantly in one letter, but his manner is 
heavier and more ornate than that of his model. It is hard 
to understand the admiration once felt for these papers as 
specimens of style, but they were long considered prose clas- 
sics. Two other series of Wirt^s essays. The Rainbow and The 
Old Bachelor, also went through several editions, and some 
of his speeches, especially that on the trial of Aaron Burr, 
were well known. Probably his most popular work was 
Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry, a fasci- 
nating biography of the old-fashioned literary type. 

Another Maryland writer who should be remembered is 
Francis Scott Key (1780-1843), the author of "The Star- 
Spangled Banner.^^ Nothing else in the post- 
Mmor humous collection of his poems is of value. 

Writers John Shaw (1778-1809), a naval surgeon 

born in Annapolis, wrote poems which were 
collected and published after his death. A few of his more 
pleasing songs survive in the anthologies. Edward Coate 
Pinkney (1802-1828), son of a prominent Maryland poli- 
tician, in his short life was an officer in the navy, a member 
of the bar, a volunteer in the Mexican fight for independence, 
a professor in the University of Maryland, and an editor. He 
was a hot-headed youth with a propensity for duelling, and 
his literary models were Byron and Moore. ^^Eodolph,^^ his 
longest poem, is a story of illicit love, bloodshed, remorse, 
and madness. One or two gallant and sentimental songs 
are all that survive of his thin volume of poems. 

To the southward almost the only author whose name is 
preserved was Richard Henry Wilde (1789-1847), a native of 
Ireland who came to Georgia in boyhood, and became a 
lawyer and a member of congress from that state. After 
suffering some political disappointments he went to Florence 



The Early Nineteenth Century 213 " 

and devoted himself to the study of Italian literature. His 

only important published writings are a work on Tasso and 

a long poem, Hesperia, which appeared after 

Georgia — his death. His fame has been kept alive by 

Richard Henry « ^ • i ;3 i t i *! 

Wilde ^ ^^^§ irom an uniinished opera, published 

under various titles, but best known by the 

first line^ ^^My life is like the summer rose.^^ 

By the opening of the nineteenth century the region west of 

the AUeghanies was beginning to be important politically and 

^, „, economically, and to have a life of its own. 

The West . . 

There were two chief literary centres in the 

West, Lexington, Kentucky, and Cincinnati, Ohio; but sev- 
eral other enterprising towns settled by emigrants from the 
more intellectual states of the Bast supported literary periodi- 
cals. Lexington was the seat of Transylvania University, 
which was founded as an academy in the preceding century, 
and began to confer the bachelor's degree in 1802. The 
^^Medley,'' the first literary monthly in the West, was estab- 
lished at Lexington in 1803. The commercial importance of 
Cincinnati gave that city an advantage, and it early became 
a centre for the publication of both books and periodicals. 
The intrinsic merit of the western writings was not great, 
but the spirit shown in various literary enterprises was re- 
markable. The authors had the taste and the standards of the 
East, but their isolation, their enthusiasm for the new country, 
and the feeling of independence natural in frontier life con- 
spired to give western literature a distinction which it lost 
when improved means of communication bound East and 
West more closely together. 

Among the authors and editors of this region who deserve 
mention were Timothy Flint and James Hall. Flint (1780- 

, ^,. 1840) was born and died in Massachusetts, 
Timothy Fhnt , , , . . • ,. 

but spent some years as a missionary m the 

West, and was for a time editor of a magazine in Cincinnati. 



214 American Literature 

His most valuable writings were historical and descriptive, 
but he also wrote two highly colored romances, and some 
translations from the French. 

James Hall (1793-1868) was born and educated in Phila- 
delphia. He served in the war of 1812, and afterward held 
TT II ^ commission in the regular army. In 1818 

he resigned from the service to begin the prac- 
tice of law at Pittsburg. In 1820 he removed to Illinois, 
where for twelve years he was editor, lawyer, and judge. 
Among other literary activities he edited the "Western Sou- 
venir,^^ an annual, in 1829, and founded the "Illinois 
Monthly Magazine^^ in 1830. Later he removed to Cincinnati, 
where he continued his editorial labors. His first important 
work was a series of letters to the "Portfolio,^^ afterward 
collected as Letters from the West. These tell of his first trip 
down the Ohio. Several volumes, of which The West, its Soil, 
Surface, and Productions is typical, give statistical, historical 
and miscellaneous information in unusually readable fashion. 
More purely literary in form are his numerous tales, sketches, 
and poems. The longest of these is Harpe's Head, A Legend 
of Kentucky. This is a story with much action, and with 
many vivid descriptions of scenery and manners, first in 
Virginia and then in Kentucky. Among collections of shorter 
tales are Legends of the West, Tales of the Border, The 
Wilderness and the War-Path. These all treat almost ex- 
clusively of western themes. Hall's poetry, consisting mostly 
of brief narrative and sentimental pieces, is of little value. 
Many of his sketches, especially those which are quiet and 
sentimental, show the influence of Irving; others which are 
more purely frontier stories and stories of action are sugges- 
tive of Cooper. The author was, however, no mere imitator. 
He had an easy and effective narrative style, and his de- 
scriptions of western life and scenery are vivid and sym- 
pathetic. 



The Early N^ineteenth Century 215 

IV. Orators; Scholars 

Public speaking continued to be held in high esteem in 
America^ and there were many men in all sections of the 
country whose eloquence was famous in their 
^^^^Yw b t ^^y* Some of these have already been men- 
tioned in connection with other kinds of literary 
activity. The life of Daniel Webster (1782-1852), the great- 
est of the New England orators, belongs rather to political 
than to literary history, and is too well known to need more 
than brief statement here. He was the son of a New Hamp- - 
shire farmer. In childhood his chief characteristics were ill 
health and great shyness. Signs of intellectual brilliancy 
induced his father to send him to Dartmouth college. He 
studied law and practiced in various towns of Massachusetts, 
finally in Boston. For the last twenty-five years of his life he 
was a member of the United States senate, except during two 
periods when he was secretary of state. The best remembered 
of his occasional addresses are the oration delivered at the 
laying of the cornerstone of the Bunker Hill monument and 
the eulogy on Adams and Jefferson. Of the congressional 
speeches the reply to Hayne, 1830, and the "Seventh of March 
Speech,^^ 1850, are best known. All of these owe some- 
thing of their fame to the importance of the occasion, and 
there are many other speeches in Webster^s collected works 
which, in parts at least, are hardly inferior. Some of his 
pleas at the bar, notably that at the trial of the murderers of 
Joseph White in Salem, have a high rank in the oratory of 
the legal profession. Though weak and shy as a boy, Webster 
developed into a man of powerful physique, with a dignity and 
a presence that verged on pomposity. The orations show 
the quality of the man. They are solid, formal, dignified, 
and have a touch of the artificial diction of the older classic 
English and American school. Webster was a man of great 



216 American Literature 

intellectual power^ and he could express his ideas with abso- 
lute clearness ; but the distinctive characteristic of his orations 
is the combination of weight with the heightened manner. 
It is proof of real worth that though his style of public speak- 
ing has been abandoned in favor of the simpler manner repre- 
sented by Lincoln, yet his speeches are still read with un- 
diminished admiration. 

With the development of national consciousness and greater 
opportunities for leisurely work it was natural that there 
should be attempts in the direction of American scholarship. 
About 1820 a proposal was made to establish an American 
Academy, with headquarters at New York, but sectional jeal- 
ousies and the absurdly ambitious nature of the scheme 
brought about an early failure. A number of more modest 
learned societies came into existence during the first third of 
the century. Individual scholars, working independently or 
in connection with the leading colleges, did much creditable 
work. 

The most frequent attempts at scholarly writing were in 
the field of history and biography. As the men who had taken 
part in the Eevolution and the organization 
Biography ^^ ^^le government passed away, there was a 

Weems ' natural tendency to write their biographies. 

Every American with the instincts of an his- 
torian prepared his life of Washington, and from this often 
proceeded to the consideration of other men. Among the ear- 
liest was Mason L. Weems (1760P-1825), an eccentric Vir- 
ginia preacher and book agent, who took advantage of the 
interest occasioned by Washington's death, and the next year, 
1800, brought out a biography. This was exceedingly popular, 
and is now notorious as the source of the hatchet story and 
other anecdotes which were apparently manufactured by an au- 
thor who knew what the public wanted. Weems later wrote lives 
of Franklin, Marion, and Penn, less famous than his Wash- 



The Early Nineteenth Century 217 

ington, but equally unreliable. A very different biography is 

that by another Virginian^ John Marshall (1755-1835). By 

, , „ , „ his service as a soldier in the Eevolution and 
John Marshall , . . ., ... 

nis experience m various civil capacities, 

culminating in his appointment as Chief Justice of the United 
States, he had acquired a thorough knowledge of the public 
affairs with- which Washington was concerned. The prepara- 
tion of the Life was undertaken at the request of Washing- 
ton's family, and the five volumes appeared at intervals be- 
tween 1804 and 1807. It was too early for a judicial and 
definitive biography, but Marshall's work shows fairness, 
care, and the power and weight that characterize all his writ- 
ings. It is still a classic. 

Jared Sparks (1789-1866) was a more systematic historical 
scholar. His early connection with the "N'orth American 
Eeview'' has already been spoken of ; later he 
was professor of history and president at 
Harvard college. He " is remembered chiefly, however, as 
biographer, and as editor of the writings of Washington, 
Franklin, and other American statesmen. His practice of 
omitting passages from the letters that he edited, and of mak- 
ing grammatical and other emendations, is discountenanced 
by later scholars, but was justified on the theory that nothing 
should be made public which would lessen reverence for the 
founders of the nation. His work was carefully done and, 
except for these emendations, his editions are authentic. He 
was a worthy predecessor of the great historians that Har- 
vard produced in the next generation. 

Among minor historians who deserve brief mention is 
Isaiah Thomas (1749-1831), a New England editor and pub- 
lisher, who wrote a History of Printing in 
Historians America, which is still a standard work. 

Samuel L. Knapp (1783-1838), an editor and 
late in life a New York lawyer, published many miscellaneous 



218 American Literature 

writings, and edited a Library of American History. To the 
student of to-day his most interesting work is a series of lec- 
tures on American Literature, published in 1829. These are 
rambling and over-patriotic, but give interesting contempo- 
rary estimates of American authors and of literature in gen- 
eral. David Eamsey (1749-1815), a native of Philadelphia, 
but for most of his life a resident of Charleston, South 
Carolina, was a surgeon in the Revolutionary war, and after- 
ward the author of History of the American Revolution, 
Life of Oeorge Washington, and History of the United States. 
While not a great judicial historian his writings carry con- 
siderable authority. 

Western writers gave the material for history rather than 
the finished work. Besides Timothy Flint and James Hall, 
who have already been mentioned, Henry Eowe 
Sh^lcrafr Schoolcraft (1793-1864) deserves to be re- 
membered. He was born in New York and 
was first attracted to the West by his interest in geology and 
mineralogy. Afterward he became an Indian agent and was 
connected with various government commissions. He published 
accounts of his travels and many historical and ethnological 
works relating to the Indians. He was especially interested 
in Indian folk lore, and prepared two collections of tales, 
Algic Researches, 1839, and The Myth of Hiawatha and other 
oral Legends, 1856. He also wrote a number of rather con- 
ventional poems on Indian subjects. The interest of his prose 
works lies chiefly in the subject matter, but his style is simple 
and usually adequate. 

In natural science America continued to furnish a con- 
siderable number of able workers, some of whom wrote with 
. ability. In Philadelphia, where scientific tra- 

ditions were strong, Benjamin Eush (1745- 
1813), a prominent physician and man of affairs, published 
about the opening of the century several works on medical 



The Early Nineteenth Century 219 

and miscellaneous subjects. To Philadelphia came the Scotch 
poet^ Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), who turned his atten- 
tion from verse-making to the preparation of his famous 
ornithology. In New England perhaps the leading scientist 
was Benjamin Silliman (1779-1864), long professor at Yale 
college, and founder of the ^^American Journal of Science.'^ 
He combined the true scientific spirit with a faculty for popu- 
lar exposition, and probably did more than any other man 
to extend the interest in American science during the first 
half of the century. 

America has some claim to Benjamin Thompson, Count 
Eumford (1753-1814), Tory, soldier of fortune, and physicist. 
He was a native of Massachusetts, though his 
g ^^^. famous experiments on the nature of heat were 

conducted in France. Nathaniel Bowditch 
(1773-1838), in early life a sailor of Salem, published valu- 
able works on applied mathematics and translated Laplace. 

Lexicography and the philological sciences were also well 
represented in New England. ISToah Webster, whose earlier 
work was mentioned in the preceding chapter. 
Lexicographers Published a grammar in 1807, and con- 
tinued his linguistic studies at Amherst, 
where he aided in founding the college, at New Haven, and 
in England. The first edition of his famous Dictionary was 
published in 1828. Joseph E. Worcester (1784-1865), a 
rival lexicographer, was born in New Hampshire, but lived 
most of his life in Massachusetts. He edited Johnson^s 
Dictionary and prepared an abridgment of Webster^s before 
he issued his own in 1830. 



CHAPTEK IV 

The Central Period (1833-1883) 

I. General Conditions 

It has already been remarked that in the fourth decade of 

the nineteenth century great changes took place in the po- 

. . litical, religious, and social thought of the 

of the Period country, and showed themselves in all forms 

National of literary expression. The perfection of the 

on 1 ions steam boat and the beginnings of the railroad 

established the possibility of easy communication between 
different sections of a great country, and definitely answered 
the question whether the United States could continue as one 
nation. At the same time sectional differences increased 
rather than diminished. The West grew influential in poli- 
tics, and through its influence the free, energetic, but unculti- 
vated type of man became more conspicuous in public affairs. 
The development of cotton raising and other industrial 
changes made the South more dependent than ever before on 
slave labor. On the other hand the disapproval of slavery, 
which had long existed and had been steadily growing in the 
North, was intensified by the spirit of democratic reform 
which was felt about this time in both Europe and America. 
As a result North and South found themselves sharply at 
variance over a matter which had serious moral aspects, and 
which appealed to the sentiments of both parties. In New 
England the increased interest in political and sociological 
questions was accompanied by great changes in philosophy and 
religious belief. About this time, too, appeared the first pub- 
lished writings of a number of men who were born in the first 

220 



The Central Period 221 

decade of the century^,* and who afterward became the most 
distinguished in American letters. 

The men^ the problems, and the methods of thought that 
came into prominence between 1830 and 1840 continued 

strong in the intellectual life of the nation 
The Close of ^^-^ ^^ j^^^^ j^^lf ^ generation after the Civil 

the Period ° 

War. The change at the close of the period 

was even more gradual than that at the beginning; but be- 
tween 1880 and 1890 there was a noticeable weakening of the 
older sectional feeling, and a tendency toward a readjustment 
of political lines. Younger men came into prominence in 
literature, and the intellectual prestige of New England was 
weakened. ISTo one date in the decade is more significant than 
another of this change. The year 1883 has been chosen to 
end the period because it rounds out a half century. 

One characteristic of the period under discussion was the 
passage of literary supremacy from ISTew York to New Eng- 
land, or more specifically to Boston and its en- 
Massachus^^^^^^ virons. Irving and Cooper continued to write, 
but after 1833 they did nothing to increase 
the reputations that they had already won, and they inspired 
no successors of their own rank. The Connecticut writers, 
with their mild conservatism and their devotion to the moral 
and the commonplace, failed equally to express the spirit of 
the time. It was the beginning of an era of vigorous mental 
activity and moral questioning, and it was fitting that the 
descendants of the most virile of the Puritans should take the 
lead. The literary ascendency of Massachusetts was not geo- 
graphical but racial. The leaders whose names will be men- 
tioned later could almost without exception trace their an- 
cestry back to the emigrants of the early seventeenth century. 

Two great movements stirred New England during this 

* Garrison, Willis, Simms, Emerson, Longfellow, Hawthorne, Whittier, Holmes, 
and Poe, as well as many of their lesser contemporaries, were born in the years 
1803-9 inclusive. 



222 American Literature 

period — transcendentalism and abolitionism. Both were 
ethical, but one looked toward religion and belief, the other 

toward politics and action. Both were so 
wo rea strongly reflected in literature that it will be 

convenient to group together the authors who 
were especially concerned with each. 

II. The New England Transcendentalists 

The term ^^transcendentalist'^ was originally a nickname 
applied to the enthusiastic devotees of the idealistic phi- 
losophy ; and transcendentalism has never been 

Transcenden- better defined than by Emerson when he said 

talism l?V^as 

Idealism ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ idealism as it appeared in New 

England about 1840. A more exact definition 
is impossible, for New England transcendentalism was not a 
system capable of formulation, and the transcendentalists 
agreed only in spirit, not in belief. Idealism in New England 
was not new. Though not definitely recognized and called by 
name, it was always strong in Puritanism. The revolution by 
which, in the preceding period. Harvard college and most of 
the older New England churches had become Unitarian was 
largely an intellectual movement. Its great achievement was 
the establishment of the right of free thought. Transcenden- 
talism in one of its aspects was the assertion, under the new 
conditions of freedom, of the idealism that survived from the 
old faith. The form of this assertion was modified by the 
formulated idealistic philosophy of Kant and other Germans. 
At first, however, the German language was almost unknown, 
and German thinkers were studied through the interpretations 
of Coleridge, Carlyle, and the French writers. 

As transcendentalism was not a system, perhaps no two of 
the so-called transcendentalists believed exactly the same. 
They agreed, however, in denying the postulate of Locke 
that the mind of a child is like a sheet of blank paper on 



The Central Period 223 

which knowledge is written only by experience. They main- 
tained, on the contrary, that every man has certain ideas, 
like, for example, those of right and wrong, 
tsSS^B^eUefs" which are innate, which transcend experience, 
and which may be incapable of intellectual 
proof. This belief implies a close relation between every indi- 
vidual and the source of all wisdom, and carries as a corollary 
that in the domain of these innate ideas it is necessary only 
to look earnestly within one^s self to learn the truth. It was 
the absurd and unphilosophical application of this theory 
that did most to bring transcendentalism into disrepute. 
Into the transcendental camp rushed fanatics who looked 
within themselves and found the revelation that it was sin- 
ful to eat potatoes, or to wear clothing of a certain cut, or 
perhaps to wear any clothing at all. These absurdities are 
even yet associated with the word transcendentalism; but 
the transcendentalists were as a whole sensible people, who 
did valuable service in helping to preserve the idealism that 
has always been a marked American characteristic. 

With the development of idealism went other tendencies 
not philosophical which had their influence on transcenden- 
talism. The descendants of the Puritans were 

The "Renais- ^^ |g^g^ breakin^r loose from traditions of all 
sstuce of New 

England sorts, and beginning the period of investiga- 

tion and activity that Professor Wendell aptly 
calls the ^^renaissance^^ of New England. The college cur- 
riculum was broadened by increasing the attention given to 
''belles lettres'' — the customary academic designation for 
courses in literature — and by the introduction of modern 
languages. Once the exploration of unfamiliar fields was 
begun, enthusiasts rushed everywhere — into the medieval poets 
and the oriental mystics. So sudden was this movement and 
so vast were the regions just discovered that at first there was 
no scholarly thoroughness, and no true appreciation of values. 



234 American Literatu 

To know a poet's name and a few translated quotations from 
his works was justification for mentioning him in terms of 
familiarity. At the same time with these excursions into 
literature there was a sudden introduction of the other arts, 
attended often with the same strange judgments as to values. 

The nearest approach to an organization of the transcen- 
dentalists was an informal association sometimes spoken of 
^ as the Symposium, and by outsiders as the 

g ® . Transcendental Club. Among the chief mem- 

bers were Ealph Waldo Emerson, Henry David 
Thoreau, Amos Bronson Alcott, Margaret Fuller, George Eip- 
ley, F. H. Hedge, James Freeman Clarke, C. A. Bartol, Eliza- 
beth Palmer Peabody, Theodore Parker, W. H. Channing, 
J. S. Dwight, and Jones Very. Brownson, Bancroft, Cranch, 
and others were occasional attendants. Meetings were first 
held in 1836, and continued for some time at irregular 
intervals. 

Among the tangible results of the transcendental move- 
ment were the ^^DiaF' and the Brook Farm Community. 

The ^^DiaP' was a quarterly published from 
The "Dial" 

1840 to 1844 by the more enthusiastic devotees 

of the new philosophy. It was edited at first by Margaret 

Fuller and afterward by Emerson. Those who have access 

to its now rare files will find it the best illustration of the 

aspirations of the transcendentalists and of some of their 

chief follies. 

The Brook Farm Settlement was a mildly communistic 

experiment at West Eoxbury, near Boston, between 1841 and 

1847. Its chief promoter was George Eipley, 
The Brook and among his coadjutors were Hawthorne 

Community ^^^ Charles A. Dana. George William Curtis 

was a resident, though not a stockholder. 
Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Horace Greeley, and others were 
interested in the plan and gave it qualified endorsement. 



The Central Period 225 

though they regarded it as impracticable and declined to 
become members. The ideas that underlay the experiment 
were the dignity of labor^ the desirability of living close to 
nature, and the advantage of mutual helpfulness. The plan, 
especially at first, was not in any way radical, and aimed at 
no revolution in the social structure. A company was organ- 
ized and investors took stock as in any other business concern. 
Eesidents were to do a certain share of labor or pay for their 
board. Plans were made to conduct a school and in other 
ways to supplement the income from the farm. Families were 
to preserve their identity and every member was to retain 
full control of himself and his property. After a time the 
community became influenced by the more radical ideas of 
Fourier and lost something of its early simplicity. This may 
have hastened the inevitable dissolution of the association, 
as did a serious loss by fire in the spring of 1846. Though 
the fame of the community is due as much to its picturesque- 
ness as to its importance, it is a significant illustration of the 
way in which idealistic Yankees set about reforming the 
world. 

The greatest and the most representative of the transcenden- 
talists, and the oldest of the greater New England men of let- 
ters, was Ealph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882). 
Emeio™'' He was born in Boston, the descendant of long 
lines of clergymen. His father was pastor of 
the First Church of Boston, which had become Unitarian. 
The elder Emerson died in 1811, leaving his wife and five 
small children dependent upon themselves and the aid of 
friends. Expenditures for food and clothing were minimized 
to provide means for education. Pen pictures of Waldo as 
a ^^spiritual looking boy'^ who never smiled and never in- 
dulged in boy^s play are somewhat painful, and it would be 
pleasant to believe them the imaginings of later admirers. 
He attended the Boston Latin school, and afterward entered 



236 American Literature 

Harvard college, where he ran errands for the president, 
waited on table at commons, and received aid from scholarT 
ship funds. He was poor in mathematics, 
E^i^cation satisfactory but not brilliant in other studies. 

Ehetoric and elocution interested him, and he 
is said always to have retained a fancy that he would like to 
be professor of these branches. His reading was extensive, 
but desultory. It seems to have been understood that he 
should enter the ministry, and there is no record of the usual 
agonies over the choice of a profession. After his graduation 
in 1821 he taught school for four years to save money. Then 
he entered Harvard Divinity School, but was soon forced to 
leave on account of poor health. The next year he was 
licensed to preach, without examination. His health con- 
tinued precarious, and for some time prevented him from 
becoming a candidate for a regular pulpit. At last, in 1839, 
he became pastor of the Old North Church, Boston — formerly 
the church of the Mathers. The same year he was married to 
Miss Ellen Tucker, of Concord, New Hampshire. 

Emerson was now approaching the age of thirty and gave 
no indication of any unusual or peculiar ability. As a pul- 
pit orator he had the fascination of a fine 
Emerson as personality, and his younger hearers said that 

he ^^made religion real;^^ but his biographer 
finds nothing remarkable in his sermons. He continued in 
his pastorate until 1833, when he resigned on account of a 
disinclination to administer the Lord^s Supper. He was no 
violent iconoclast or anti-ritualist, but he found that the sac- 
rament did not mean to him what it was supposed to mean, 
and rather than go through the form without the spirit he 
proposed either that he should be excused from administering 
it, or that he should resign. The church was unwilling to 
adopt the former alternative, and a separation followed, evi- 
dently without ill feeling on either side. The church con- 



The Central Period 237 

tinned his salary for a time and he frequently occupied his 
old pulpit. 

Mrs. Emerson had died earlier in the same year, and in 

December he sailed for Malta, hoping to find better health. 

He travelled through much of Italy, visited 

ViSrto Euro e ^^^^^' ^^^ returned by way of England. He 
was not a sight-seer; he has little to say of 
scenery, or customs, or works of art. He found, as he said, 
always ^^the same faces under new caps and jackets.^^ His 
chief interest was in men, and he took pleasure in meeting 
Landor in Italy, and Coleridge, Carlyle, and Wordsworth in 
Great Britain. His visit to Carlyle at Craigenputtock was the 
beginning of a friendship that lasted till death. 

After his return to America in 1833 Emerson preached 
nearly every Sunday in Unitarian pulpits, and delivered many 
lectures. The ^^lyceums^^ which about this 
merson as ^-^^ were organized in every city and village 

and in most country districts gave the pro- 
fession of lecturer an unusual importance, and most men 
who were prominently before the public appeared more or less 
frequently upon the platform. With Emerson lecturing was 
an important avocation for forty years. He began with sub- 
jects from natural history and his travels, but his teaching 
was always ethical, and he soon gave his lectures such titles 
as his essays now bear. The extent of his tours gradually 
widened until it included Illinois and Wisconsin, and the 
border states of the South. In 1834 he settled at Concord, 
which was henceforth to be his home; and the next year he 
married Miss Lydia Jackson. A small income came to him 
from the estate of his first wife, and in later years his books 
brought him something; but at first he found it hard to live 
within his income. As the works of Carlyle appeared, he 
attended to theii republication in America, and often embar- 
rassed himself by advancing considerable sums for this pur- 



228 American Literature 

pose. He also found it necessary to keep open house for the 
many pilgrims who came to Concord to ask advice, or more 
frequently to enlist him in some wild reform. But though he 
found it necessary to practice strict economy and to lecture 
each year to make up a deficit^ he never really suffered from 
poverty. With the exception of a lecturing trip to England 

in 1847-8 his life passed uneventfully until 
Ser Yeis *^^ burning of his house in 1872. Even before 

this his friends had noticed the beginnings of 
mental weakness^ the tendency to which was probably in the 
blood. The shock and exposure at the time of the fire hastened 
the process of decay, and for the remaining ten years of his 
life he was never quite himself. His memory was pre- 
carious, and his mind lacked its old incisiveness except at 
moments. Immediately after the fire friends provided for 
a trip to the Nile, which he had always wished to see, and on 
his return he found his house rebuilt and his library in its 
old place. He occasionally repeated some of his lectures, and 
nominally superintended the publication of some new works, 
made up from old manuscripts. 

Emerson's distinctive genius developed late. His first 
publication was a thin volume entitled Nature^ issued in 

1836. The next year he attracted attention 
Emerson s ^^ j^-g pj^^ -g^^^ Kappa address at Harvard 

on ^^The American Scholar ;'' and in 1838 his 
famous address to the graduating class at Harvard Divinity 
School antagonized the conservative Unitarians, and gave him 
the reputation in some circles of being a dangerous man. 
The first series of Essays, 1841, and the second series, 1844, 
were adaptations of his lectures ; indeed the same may be said 
of most of his later prose volumes — Miscellanies, 1849, Rep- 
resentative Men, 1850, The Conduct of Life, 1860, Society 
and Solitude, 1870. English Traits, published in 1856, was 
the result of his second trip abroad. The volume entitled 



The Central Period 229 

Letters and Social Aims was compiled from his manuscripts 
under his partial direction in 1875. Another collection, 
Natural History of the Intellect, was issued after his death. 
His correspondence with Carlyle and with other friends has 
since been published, and his Journals are now being given to 
the public. 

While in college Emerson had written verse, and there is 
evidence that he always cared much for the power of poetic 
expression. He frequently refers to his poetic 
Emerson s temperament, and even speaks of himself as 

by nature a poet. Some of his poems were 
published in the "DiaV^ but he issued no collection until 
1847. Another volume appeared in 1865, May-Day in 1867, 
and a revised collection in 1878. In 1874 he published Par- 
nassus, an anthology made up of the English poems that he 
especially enjoyed. Most of the selections were made long be- 
fore; but the fact that some were admitted after his powers 
began to decline makes the book of little value, even as an 
indication of the editor^s taste. 

Emerson^s mind was so individual that it is hard to charac- 
terize it in ordinary terms. His great intellectuality is con- 
ceded by everyone; yet he was not a great 

Emerson's scholar or a systematic thinker. He read 

Intellectual i. -t pi'TJ^iii, j 

Characteristics ^^^^^ ^^ some periods oi his liie, but he cared 

for a striking sentence rather than for the 
organized thought of a book, and he always held that reading 
was only the recreation of a scholar. He was not deeply 
versed in any language, or science, or philosophy. His free 
handling of the names of German philosophers and of Ori-' 
ental poets might seem to imply familiarity, but, as was usual 
in his time, his references were often based on slight and 
second-hand information. As an observer, both of men and 
of nature, he was usually quick and accurate, though he 
sometimes seems shrewd rather than deep. His lack of system 



230 American Literaturf 

is seen in the disorganized structure of his lectures and essays, 
and in his failure to formulate any system, or even to classify 
materials. His justification he found in his philosophy, which 
taught him to look within himself at each moment, without 
reference to the past, and to avoid forms and systems as re- 
pressing. But his beliefs and his habits of thought coincided. 
He proceeded by insight, by inspiration, in the cant phrase 
of his admirers, by "possession,^^ rather than by ratiocinative 
processes. 

With this idealism were combined intensely practical quali- 
ties. In this respect he resembled the older Puritans, who 

with all their religious intensity built up for- 
Emerson's tunes and managed shrewdly the affairs of 

Qualities state. Emerson was not an especially good 

financier, but he had fair business instincts 
and a practical common-sense way of looking at everyday 
affairs. He made a good neighbor, who ^^always kept his 
fences up.^^ He attended town-meetings and mingled in a 
perfectly natural way with the farmers and villagers about 
him. He foretold, as clearly as any banker or merchant could 
have done, the causes that would interfere with the success of 
the Brook Farm community. Surrounded as he was by 
cranks and enthusiasts, he tried no wilder experiments than 
practicing vegetarianism for a few weeks, and inviting the 
house-maids to sit at the family table. It was this happy 
balance between the transcendental and the practical that 
gave him his leadership. His words inspired the most ideal- 
istic of his followers. His actions gave no offense and little 
chance for ridicule to the most hard-headed critic. Moreover 
he had the judgment to see what he could and could not do, 
and where his own work lay, and he refused to be closely 
allied with extreme reforms of any kind. Even where he 
sympathized with a crusade like that against slavery, he felt 
that the active work could best be done by others. He never 



, The Central Period 231 

temporized, or concealed his thoughts. His speech on John 
Brown and other anti-slavery utterances are strong; but he 
did not give himself entirely to the movement, and to re- 
formers with one idea seemed lukewarm. 

Personally Emerson seems to have exercised a fascination 

on all who knew him. People went to his lectures because 

of the man, if not for his ideas. Even the 

Emerson s ^jj^ reformers who failed to win him to their 

Personality . m n ,> i . . . i n 

own notions usually left him with no less of 

love and admiration because of their disappointment. The 
few glimpses that we have of his home life show almost ideal 
relations with his children ; and the ^^curious, sociable, cheer- 
ful public funeral/^ as Henry James calls it, was only one 
indication of the way he was regarded by his Concord neigh- 
bors. Still, there was an aloofness about him that kept all 
men at a little distance. He had no intimates outside of his 
own family. While in college he sometimes joined convivial 
circles, and later he was a welcome member of the famous 
Saturday Club, which included all the prominent literary men 
of Boston. But though always gracious and winning, he 
never allowed his reserve to be broken down. 

Emerson's literary tastes are not easily learned or under- 
stood. His biographer says that he saw nothing in Shelley, 

Aristophanes, Don Quixote, Miss Austen, 
£.merson s Dickens — a list as heterogeneous as those 

which he loved to put together for himself. 
There is hardly more similarity between the authors that he 
admired — Byron, Moore, George Herbert, Beaumont and 
Fletcher. One is led to suppose that his enthusiasm for Goethe 
was caught mostly from Carlyle; and that his interest in 
Hafiz and other Orientals was, unconsciously of course, a 
little faddish. His writings show quotations from a great 
range of authors, but they are mostly striking phrases, 
chosen for themselves and not for their connection with a sys- 



233 American Literature 

tern of ideas. It was probably the authors who could furnish 
such phrases that he enjoyed most. He set great store by 
form of expression, and was forever striving for it. Not even 
personal friendship could reconcile him to Carlyle's prose 
style. He had, as Lowell points out, an acute sense for the 
inevitable word. He composed by sentences, and when a 
sentence shaped itself for him he put it in his notebook for 
use as occasion arose. His lectures and essays were made up 
of these prearranged sentences with more or less of connective 
material supplied. He never spoke impromptu, and he was 
not great as a letter writer. On the whole, he seems to have 
had no philosophy of literature, but to have liked the work 
which had form, and which appealed to him in his mood. It 
seems hopeless to attempt to trace a connection between his 
reading and his prose style. 

The first published work. Nature, differs but little in style 
from those that follow. It has slightly more of plan, though 
logical sequence is not always found where it 
^ ^^® is promised. It contains illustrations of the 

author's favorite habit of enumerating a list of heterogeneous 
persons, or things, as ^^anguage, sleep, madness, dreams, 
beasts, sex.'' And it abounds in the short, quotable sentences 
which are so forceful in the essays: ^^N'ature never wears a 
mean appearance;" ^^Give me health and a day, and I will 
make the pomp of emperors ridiculous;" ^^Man is the dwarf 
of himself f "k\\ that Adam had, all that Caesar could, you 
have and do." The leading idea of Nature is that which 
has already been given as the central thought of transcen- 
dentalism. Every soul is of the divine essence, and may have 
communication with all that is divine in the universe; and 
since all things and all actions are manifesta- 
mTs^e^T ^ *^^^^ ^^ ^^^ divine, it may read a spiritual les- 

son in every work of nature or of art. This 
thought, with its resulting lesson of individual dignity and its 



The Central Period 233 

innumerable corollaries and applications, is the author's one 
message to the world, and is found on almost every page that 
he wrote. Thus, the essay on ^^History'^ begins : 

There is one mind common to aU individual men. Every man is 
an inlet to the same and to all of the same. He that is once admitted 
to the right of reason is made a freeman of the whole estate. What 
Plato has thought, he may think ; what a saint has felt, he may feel ; 
what at any time has befallen any man, he can understand. Who 
hath access to this universal mind, is a party to all that is or can 
be done, for this is the only and sovereign agent. 

Passages were frequently transferred from one lecture to 
another, and new lectures were made up by piecing together 
passages from old ones. It is often impossible on reading a 
paragraph to guess in what particular essay or lecture it may 
be found. 

It is not true, however, that the author mainly repeats him- 
self. His lesson is one which has so many applications, and 
on which so much depends, that each statement under new 
conditions seems a new thought. It is probably impossible 
now for anyone to receive from the Essays the same tonic 
effect that they gave to the author's contemporaries. For 
two generations they have been common property, and not 
only their ideas but their imagery are everywhere echoed in 
the pulpit, the lecture room, and the review article. Every 
young man and woman is familiar through indirect sources 
with much of the best that Emerson has to offer. Yet it is 
probable that to-day few readers, certainly few young readers 
of idealistic tendencies, make their first acquaintance with 
the Essays without receiving a distinct stimulus. There is 
little that seems really new. Indeed, some of the most effective 
ideas are those that the reader at once recognizes as his own ; 
but there is a suggestiveness which starts train after train 
of thought. 

It is sometimes charged that Emerson is too hopeful, that 
he disregards the evil and the disappointment in the world, 



234 American Literature 

and leads his readers to expect too much of life. This is 
undoubtedly true^ and each reader must decide for himself 

whether it is a defect. In Emerson's own 
Emerson's ^y^g j|. ^^g ^^j.^ ^ ^^^ ^jj-j^ j.^^ acuteness 

Optimism 

of observation shown in his countless descrip- 
tions of nature and in his homely illustrations from life could 
hardly fail to see the evil as well as the good. That he pre- 
ferred to ignore it rather than to make it conspicuous by wag- 
ing open fight only shows his faith in his ideals. A more 
serious charge against the essays is the inconsistency of oc- 
casional passages^ and the use of phrases which taken by theni- 

selves seem over-audacious. This arises from 
J^^;^g^^^^^^^^ the habit of looking at a truth from different 

angles in order to gain a complete view, and 
caused the author no concern whatever. Yet the reader who, 
ignorant of Emerson^ meets for the first time the phrase "I 
am part or parcel of God/' or a passage like the following 
from the essay on ^^Self-Eeliance/' is likely to be shocked or 
bewildered : 

Do not teU me, as a good man did to-day, of my obligation to put 
aU poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, 
thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the 
cent I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do 
not belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual 
affinity I am bought and sold ; for them I will go to prison, if need 
be ; but your miscellaneous popular charities ; the education at college 
of fools ; the building of meeting-houses to the vain end to which 
many now stand ; alms to sots ; and the thousand-fold Relief Societies ; 
— though I confess with shame I sometimes succumb and give the 
dollar, it is a wicked dollar which by-and-by I shall have the manhood 
to withhold. 

To the habitual reader of Emerson, however, statements like 
these appear in their true relation, and seem both plain and 
natural. 

The peculiar structure of the prose is such that what is 
true of one volume is true of all. Probably the two series 



The Central Period 235 

of Essays are now the most widely read^ though at first they 
attracted little attention. Representative Men was in plan 

suggested by Heroes and Hero-Worship. 
Characteristics Some of the early addresses collected in the 
Pj.Qgg volume of Miscellanies are more coherent 

and more logical in structure than most of 
the other works. English Traits is not an ordinary traveller's 
book^ but as the title implies is a discussion of the characteris- 
tics of a people, with such chapter headings as ^^Eace/' 
^'Ability/' '^Manners/' "Truth/' and "Character.'' Emerson 
liked the English, though he saw their weaknesses, and the 
book shows shrewd and kindly insight. The posthumous vol- 
ume Natural History of the Intellect bears a title which 
Emerson had long had in mind as that of a work on philoso- 
phy, and which he gave to a series of lectures delivered at 
Harvard college; but most of the material of these lectures 
appears in his other writings, and but two or three of them 
are given in this final volume. 

The poems show as much individuality as the prose, and 
have probably been the cause of more discussion. The ideas 

that they present are the same as those of the 

Emerson's 

p essays, though with more stress on the beauty 

of nature. In form they tend to the irregular 

and occasionally to the eccentric. The usual verdict of the 

author's early contemporaries was that of the "Fable for 

Critics :" 

Whose prose is grand verse, while his verse, the Lord knows, 
Is some of it pr — No, 'tis not even prose ! 

and they were accused of utter lack of rhythm, melody, and 
metre. It is an interesting illustration of the growing accom- 
modation of the ear to flexibility in verse that these criticisms 
seem absurd now. Still there are occasional harsh lines, and 
false rhymes, many of which are not, however, displeasing 
to those who enjoy a subtle assonance. Metrical students also 



236 American Literature 

say with truth that he commanded few measures, and had a 
fondness for the somewhat jigging octosyllabics. Another 
peculiarity which offends some readers is the use in imagina- 
tive passages of words with unpoetic associations. Emerson 
went as far as any of the poets who believed in the democracy 
of words. His usage has sometimes an effectiveness of its 
own, as in the quatrain: 

He planted where the deluge ploughed, 
His hired hands were wind and cloud ; 
His eyes detect the Gods concealed 
In the hummock of the field. 

More questionable are the lines on the pine-tree in ^^Wood- 
notes '/^ 

My garden is the cloven rock, 

And my manure the snow. 

And to the unsympathetic reader the poetic approaches the 
ridiculous in the passage from "The Sphinx:'^ 

Erect as a sunbeam 

Upspringeth the palm ; 
The elephant browses, 

Undaunted and calm. 

Despite all this technical criticism the poems have a 
wonderful charm for many readers. Among the rough verses 
are passages of haunting cadence and melody, and often whole 
poems where an admirer, at least, would want no line changed. 
True, the longer poems are formless, and "May-Day^^ when 
republished was changed as "if half its paragraphs were to 
be taken and shuffled like a pack of cards.^^ The "Threnody,'^ 
written on the death of the author's son, shows too intense 
personal sorrow to compete with smoother and more academic 
elegies. The long poems must be read, like the essays, in 
bits. A few of the shorter poems, like "The Sphinx^' and "The 
Problem,'^ were long held up to ridicule as unintelligible, 
though it does not seem that they should offer much difficulty 



The Central Period 337 

to one who knew Emerson's philosophy. It is in some of the 
briefer poems^, like the "Concord Hymn/' "Ehodora/' and 
"Days/' and even more epigrammatic passages and fragments, 
that his power is seen. The bulk of these is very small, but 
their value lies in the concentration of thought and perfection 
of form. 

It is the usual fate of a prose essayist whose ideas are 
more valuable than his form to be neglected after his message 
is understood and diffused; and it seems prob- 
Fate of ^ ^^Iq j^Y^^j^ ^j^^g fate will slowly overtake Emerson. 

Pj.Qgg So far as the sentence and the apt word are con- 

cerned his manner is worthy of his thought ; and 
many of his phrases are now embedded in our speech. The lack 
of unity and logical sequence, however, is so serious a blemish 
on the prose writings as a whole that it would be rash to pre- 
dict their permanency. As yet, however, the Essays, judged 
by the test of cheap reprints and large sales, are almost un- 
diminished in popularity. 

It seems possible, though it is too soon to make the predic- 
tion, that the writings of Emerson that stand best chance of 
permanency are the better poems. These won 
th^^^^^^^*^ ^ their first appreciation from persons who knew 
the essays, while other readers maintained that 
they were obscure. With the wider dissemination of ideal- 
istic views, most persons have the clew to their interpretation, 
and few of the verses trouble any careful reader to-day. The 
essays, built as they were from lyceum lectures, have something 
of the provincial about them. They seem calculated for the 
meridian of Boston and the year 184 — . The poems have, as 
all true poetry has, more of a universal quality. British 
readers, for whom the essays were not especially designed, 
have always ranked the poems relatively high. It is notice- 
able, too, that much of the late verse of minor American poets 
shows a legitimate but unmistakable influence of Emerson. 



238 American Literature 

Whatever the ultimate fate of Emerson's writings, he will 
always occupy a prominent place in the history of American 

thought. At the most critical time in the 
Emerson s intellectual development of the country his 

influence was greater than that of any other 
man. He suited his generation and his surroundings. Even 
to the present time he takes almost unquestioned rank as the 
most powerful and stimulating ethical teacher that the nation 
has produced. 

The second of the transcendentalists in literary importance 
was Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862). He was born at 

Concord, Massachusetts, where his father had 

enry avia failed in trade and become a maker of lead 
Thoreau 

pencils. Though his family was not well-to-do, 

he managed, partly through the aid of scholarships and his 
own labors, to complete a course at Harvard. He seems to 
have been a fair student, though he was not always tractable, 
and made a not wholly favorable impression on the faculty. 
After his graduation he supported himself by surveying and 
such odd jobs as whitewashing, and by the slight returns from 
lecturing and writing. His failure to adopt a profession came 
not from laziness, but from the fact that he had no dependents 
and few physical wants, and that he wished to be independent. 
His acquaintance with Emerson began about the time of his 
graduation from Harvard in 1837, and from 1841 to 1843 
he was a member of Emerson's household. In 1845 he built 
a hut on the shore of Walden Pond, near Concord, and lived 
there alone for two or three years. At various times he took 
trips through New England by boat and on foot, and these 
furnished material for much of his writing. During his life- 
time he published two volumes, A WeeTc on the Concord and 
Merrimac Rivers, and Walden, or Life in the Woods. He de- 
livered occasional lectures, and contributed a number of short 
essays to the "Dial" and other magazines. Since his death 



The Central Period 239 

these essays^ and other writings left unpublished^ have been 

issued in several volumes. 

None of the biographies of Thoreau is satisfactory, and it 

is hard to arrive at a sure estimate of his personality. He 

had a strain of eccentricity, probably derived 

oreau s from his mother's family, but his peculiarities 

Personality . ' ^ 

seem to have been misunderstood and their 

importance overrated. His experiment in the simple life 
at Walden has caused him to be styled a hermit and a recluse, 
though he vrent to the village daily, and always welcomed in- 
tercourse with friends. One-sided and paradoxical statements 
which he loved to make for their startling effect earned for 
him the reputation of being stoical and misanthropic, and of 
"not believing in civilization.'^ His refusal to pay taxes to 
a government that he thought unjust was a procedure advo- 
cated by many other abolitionists. Though he had many pe- 
culiarities, he was a man of strong human emotions, which :at 
times he liked to conceal. He had a great fondness for nature, 
of which he was an almost abnormally keen observer. He 
took especial delight in seeing what others left unnoticed in 
things about him. He says, "I omit the unusual . . . 
and describe the common. This has the greatest charm, and 
is the true theme of poetry.'' It was with the eye of a poet 
that he usually looked at nature, though he turned his powers 
to account in making some natural history collections for 
Agassiz. His love of nature did not, however, interfere with 
his interest in books. He was a wide reader, of catholic taste, 
and an indefatigable student when he once began a subject. 
He knew the Greek poets thoroughly and made careful trans- 
lations from some of them. Like many other transcendental- 
ists he dabbled in the Oriental writers. He was widely read 
in English literature, not only in the classics, but in out-of- 
the-way writers, like the minor Elizabethan dramatists and 
the lesser poets of the seventeenth century. His biographer 



240 American Literature 

computes that there are quotations from a hundred authors 
in one of his books alone; and most of these fit the context 
naturally, not as if introduced to show recently acquired eru- 
dition. His criticisms, as of Chaucer in the Weelc on the 
Concord and Merrimac Rivers, show shrewd appreciation of 
literary merit. His reading extended even to town histories 
and similar sources of information, from which he gathered 
interesting bits of fact. He was strongly influenced by the 
transcendental ideas, and as he lacked Emerson's sanity and 
balance he sometimes went astray. He was, however, prob- 
ably aware of the full absurdity of his most startling 
expressions. 

The character of Thoreau's writings is indicated by the 
titles of the two books published during his lifetime, and by 

those given to some of the posthumous coUec- 
^oreau's ^^^^^ — Excursions, The Maine Woods, Cape 

Cod, A Yanlcee in Canada, etc. These are 
mostly descriptions of nature, combined with discussions of the 
author's philosophy of life. The nature descriptions are 
characterized by clearness, picturesqueness, quiet humor, and 
a rare individual quality. At times, however, they are marred 
by a forced pun or other consciously startling expression. 
This tendency to be startling is still more prominent in the 
frequent bits of moralizing. It is the quotation of isolated 
sayings from these passages that has given Thoreau the repu- 
tation of being more erratic than he is. In Walden, the best 
of his works, the reader is likely to be struck first by the 
oddity of a passage like the following : 

None is so poor that he need sit on a pumpkin. That is shiftless- 
ness. There is plenty of such chairs as I Uke best in the viUage 
garrets to be had for taking them away. Furniture ! Thank God, 
I can sit and I can stand without the aid of a furniture warehouse. 
What man but a philosopher would not be ashamed to see his furni- 
ture packed in a cart and going up country exposed to the light of 
heaven and the eyes of men, a beggarly account of empty boxes. That 



The Central Period 241 

is Spaulding's furniture. I could never tell from inspecting such 
a load whether it belonged to a so-called rich man or a poor one. 
Indeed, the more you have of such things the poorer you are. 

It is only after a re-reading, perhaps after reading aloud, that 
one feels the full charm of a chapter like that on ^^Sounds :'^ 

Sometimes, on Sundays, I heard the bells, the Lincoln, Acton, 
Bedford, or Concord bell, when the wind was favorable, a faint, 
sweet, and as it were, natural melody, worth importing into the 
wilderness. At a sufficient distance over the woods this sound acquires 
a certain vibratory hum, as if the pine needles in the horizon were 
the strings of a harp which it swept. All sound heard at the greatest 
possible distance produces one and the same effect, a vibration of the 
universal lyre, just as the intervening atmosphere makes a distant 
ridge of earth interesting to our eyes by the azure tint it imparts to 
it. There came to me in this case a melody which the air had strained, 
and which had conversed with every leaf and needle of the wood, that 
portion of the sound which the elements had taken up and modulated 
an'd echoed from vale to vale. 

Thoreau^s verse was mostly written while he was young, 
though a few bits are scattered through his later prose. It 

has been enthusiastically praised by admirers 
Ver^^^^ ^ ^^ ^^^ author^s philosophy, and contains some 

fine couplets and quatrains; but it is rarely 
well sustained, and the writer^s taste is not sure. Sometimes 
he strikes out a stanza like the following, in which he ante- 
dates a well-known poem of Matthew Arnold: 

The smothered streams of love, which flow 
More bright than Phlegethon, more low, 
Island us ever, like the sea, 
In an Atlantic mystery. 

But in close juxtaposition to this are lines like those on the 
boatbuilders heard across the river: 

The waves slowly beat 
Just to keep the noon sweet. 
And no sound is floated o*er. 
Save the mallet on shore. 
Which echoing on high, 
Seems a-calking the sky. 



242 American Literature 

In his lifetime Thoreaii was looked upon as an imitator of 

Emerson; of late years he has seemed remarkable for his 

> p ir individuality. His philosophy was no doubt 

greatly influenced by Emerson, but his literary 
style seems to have suffered more from occasional Carlylisms 
than from any unfortunate indebtedness to his friend and 
neighbor. He is one of the few American writers whose 
fame has steadily increased. His contemporaries refused to 
take him seriously, or to buy his books. Later generations 
have been glad to collect and publish all his available writings, 
and have come to esteem him for his delicate and sympathetic 
portrayals of nature and for his pointed, if impractical, 
comments on life. Though his eccentricities prevent him from 
ranking with the greatest American essayists, he has a unique 
charm for many readers, and his place in American literature 
seems secure. 

Amos Bronson Alcott (1799-1888), the best known of the 
more erratic idealists, was the son of a Connecticut farmer. 

His family name was Alcox, and he made the 
^^^^^^^^^^^^ change to Alcott on reaching manhood. He 

received a slight education in the country 
schools and from the parish minister, but by the time he was 
fifteen years of age he was working in a clock factory. After 
an unsuccessful experience as peddler in New York, Massa- 
chusetts, and the South he turned to school teaching. His 
first venture was at Cheshire, where he introduced so many 
innovations in methods of instruction and discipline that he 
was forced to leave. Afterward he taught in various schools, 
the most important of which was in Boston. Here a number 
of prominent families placed their children under his instruc- 
tion, and his attempts at educational reform attracted consid- 
erable attention. He interpreted literally the ideas expressed 
in Wordsworth's ^^Ode on Intimations of Immortality,^' and 
spent much time in discussing the eternal verities with the 



The Central Period 243 

infants committed to his charge. Some of these discussions 
were published as Conversations with Children on the Gospels 
in 1836. His patrons were startled to learn from this book 
that he had been conversing with his pupils on the physical 
phenomena of birth, and many of them withdrew their chil- 
dren. The end of the school came a litile later when he 
alienated his remaining supporters by admitting a colored 
pupil. 

By this time Alcott was a transcendentalist of the mystic 

sort, interested in temperance, women^s rights, dress reform, 

dietetics, the water cure, and all the other fads 

Alcotfs Tran- ^^^^ which New England was then agitated, 
scendentalism . . ° ° 

He aided in founding the Symposium, which 

included most of the leading devotees of the new philosophy. 
He also began to hold ^^conversations'^ at which, for a sub- 
stantial fee, he discussed the nature of things. In 1837 he 
had completed a rhapsodical work entitled Psyche, or the 
Breath of Childhood, but it was never published. A few 
years later he removed to Concord and endeavored to make 
a living by day labor among his neighbors. The demands 
made upon his time by reform conventions and the visits 
of other enthusiasts were, however, so great that his family 
had but precarious support. His theories had already 
gained some following among the more erratic liberals abroad, 
and in 1842 Emerson and other friends subscribed money to 
send him to England. Here he found some congenial spirits, 
but failed to make a favorable impression on Carlyle. When 
he returned he brought with him two Englishmen, Lane and 
Wright, who were looking for a spot ^Vhereon the new Eden 
may be planted.^^ They secured a farm which they rechris- 
tened "Pruitlands,'^ and on which they endeavored to found a 
community which should be less sordid than that at Brook 
Farm. No animal products were to be eaten, and the soil was 
not to be insulted by the admixture of manures of animal 



244 American Literature 

origin. The rights of worms and insects were to be respected. 
No vegetables were to be eaten which, like the potato, grew 
downward instead of aspiring. After the failure of this 
experiment the Alcott family endured various vicissitudes 
until 1857, when they again settled at Concord. After the 
eldest daughter, Louisa, became able to support the family 
with her pen her father gave all his time to writing and philo- 
sophical speculation. In 1879 he was instrumental in found- 
ing the Concord School of Philosophy, of which he continued 
as dean until his death. In the winter of 1880-81 he made 
an extended trip in the West giving conversations. At this 
time he was returning to something approaching orthodoxy 
in religious belief. In 1882 he suffered a paralytic stroke, 
after which he wrote nothing. 

Besides the writings already mentioned Alcott published in 
the ^^DiaF^ his ^^Orphic Sayings,'^ a series of sententious ob- 
servations which were often unintelligible, and 
^^?, ^ which did as much as any one thing to expose 

transcendentalists to ridicule. Between 1868 
and his death he issued several volumes — Tablets, Concord 
Days, and Table Talk in prose, and Sonnets and Canzonets 
and New Connecticut in verse. Some of his prose essays, like 
those on lighter topics in Concord Days, have a pleasant 
literary flavor. Wherever he deals with philosophical questions 
he shows an abnormal mysticism in thought, and a tendency 
to be ^^orphic^^ in form. New Connecticut is autobiography 
in jingling quatrains. Sonnets and Canzonets, a series part 
of which tells the story of his love and marriage after the 
manner of an Elizabethan sonnet cycle, is in smooth conven- 
tional form, but there is evidence that his lines were retouched 
by his friends. In all his writings he shows the sense of his 
own importance which inspired his question to Emerson: 
"You write on the genius of Plato, of Pythagoras, of Jesus; 
why do you not write of me ?" 



The Central Period 245 

Alcott's friends, among whom were most of the greater 
transeendentalists, found something in the man which they 

, ^ , liked, and much in his thought which they 
Alcott'sRank /, , .. a ^ i.- ;i 

considered suggestive. Some oi his peda- 
gogical notions foreshadow theories since generally accepted. 
It is probable that he does not appear at his best in his writ- 
ings, and that he does not now have full justice done him. 
But it seems to be his fate to be remembered as an awful 
example of the extremes to which transcendentalists could go. 
Margaret Fuller (1810-1850), the most famous woman of 
the transcendental movement, was born in Cambridgeport, 

,. « Massachusetts. Her father, a somewhat er- 

Margaret Fuller . , , t • . • i i 

ratic lawyer and politician, took personal 

charge of her education, and put her through a process of 
intellectual forcing which she resented in later years. She 
began the study of Latin at six years of age, and by the time 
that she was a young woman was well versed in Latin, Ger- 
man, French, and Italian, and knew some Greek. After her 
father^s death she voluntarily assumed much of the responsi- 
bility for the care, support, and education of her younger 
brothers and sisters. She taught in Alcott's famous school 
in Boston, and in Providence, Ehode Island, and she con- 
ducted with great success conversations for classes of women 
in Boston. From 1840 to 1842 she edited the ''Dial.'' In 
1844 she became a member of the editorial staff of the ''New 
York Tribune,'' and lived for a time in the family of Horace 
Greeley. While in New York she visited many of the chari- 
table and penal institutions, and was greatly interested in 
sociological questions, particularly those relating to women. 
Her contributions to the "Tribune" were artistic, dramatic, 
and literary criticisms, and miscellaneous articles. In 1846 
she went abroad and visited England, France, and Italy. In 
England she met most of the leading men of letters, and in 
Paris formed the acquaintance of George Sand. She was in 



246 American Literature 

Italy during the troubles of 1848-9^ and was the friend and 
confidante of Mazzini^ whom she had met in London. Late in 
1847 she was secretly married to the Count Ossoli, a young 
Italian gentleman who had forsaken his family principles and 
become a liberal. The next summer she spent in the moun- 
tains of Abruzzi, where her son was born. As her marriage 
was still a secret^ she left the child with a nurse and returned 
to Eome. During the siege of 1849 she attended the wounded 
in one of the hospitals. After the victory of the French she 
went with her husband and child to Florence, and in the 
spring of 1850 the family sailed from Leghorn for New York. 
The vessel was a small merchant brig, carrying but two other 
passengers. After an unfortunate voyage, during which the 
captain died and the child was ill with the small-pox, the ves- 
sel was wrecked off Fire Island, New York, and the entire 
family was drowned. 

An attempt to understand Margaret Fuller's personality 
leads to great perplexity. To the unsympathetic world which 
saw her at a distance she was a type of the 
Maxg^et mystical transcendentalist, and a woman in 

Personality whom intellectual ambition and an extraordi- 

nary egotism had crowded out all other quali- 
ties. This estimate might be 'supported by many citations 
from her journals, letters, and writings intended for publica- 
tion. On the other hand, her friends saw in her many admir- 
able womanly qualities. A series of love-letters written in 
1845-6 to James Nathan, a Jewish commission merchant of 
New York, while they tempt severe comment on the recipient 
who made them public, tell the story of an intense romance, 
hardly to be expected of an abnormally intellectual blue-stock- 
ing of thirty-five. In the end, however, she says in her 
journal: "I shall write a sketch of it and turn the whole to 
account in a literary way, since the affections and ideal hopes 
are so unproductive.^' Her secret marriage on short acquaint- 



The Central Period 247 

ance to a man who was much her junior^ and who according to 
her own frank statement was not her intellectual equal, was 
surprising, though it proved to be ideally happy. Her refusal 
in the final crisis of her life to be saved by the only available 
means because it involved separation of the family during the 
process of rescue is interpreted by some as an illustration of 
self-will, and by others as an instance of wifely and maternal 
devotion. While no theory of her personality will explain all 
the facts that are recorded of her, the most plausible seems 
to be that she was a woman of great mental alertness and 
strongly passionate nature, influenced by all the forces of 
transcendental K'ew England. An unattractive personal ap- 
pearance, a lack of tact, and a blunt and irritating manner in- 
herited from her father repelled most persons at first sight, 
while she fascinated those who came within the range of her 
attraction. Her long friendship with Emerson is the most 
important of her intimacies. The world failed to satisfy 
either her intellectual or her emotional longings. From one 
disappointment came her mysticism, her occasional indulgence 
in the satiric mood, and her expressions of ridiculous or re- 
pelling egotism; from the other came the abandon shown in 
her letters to James Nathan, and perhaps in her marriage. 
Ill health and constant introspection led to many of her in- 
consistencies and sudden changes of mood. 

It is as an illustration of the effect of transcendentalism on 
.such a woman that the career of Margaret Fuller is chiefly 
important. Both she and her friends agreed 
Margaret ^.j^^^. ^^le talked much better than she wrote. 

Writings ^^^ ^^^^ volume. Summer on the Lakes, pub- 

lished in 1843, was based on a Western excur- 
sion, supplemented by much hard labor in the library of Har- 
vard college. Even since the editor of her collected works 
has omitted some of the longer digressions it is a disjointed 
and ill-proportioned work. Indeed, she seems always to have 



248 American Literature 

lacked a sense of literary form. Her pamphlet^ Woman in the 
Nineteenth Century, expanded from an article in the ^^Dial/^ 
was published in 1844. It was long regarded as one of 
the ablest presentations of the claims of woman, but is now 
interesting chiefly as an indication of the way in which the 
important questions regarding woman's place in society have 
changed. Just before she went abroad in 1846 she gathered 
together two volumes of her fugitive writings under the title 
of Papers on Literature and Art, The manuscript of a work 
on the Italian Eepublic, the fruit of her best labors abroad, 
was lost at the time of her death. In 1855-6 her brother 
edited four volumes of her collected works, which include, 
besides the writings already mentioned, other papers from 
periodicals, and from manuscripts, a few original poems, and 
an early metrical translation of Goethe's ^^Tasso.'' Her verse 
is unsuccessful. Her prose is on a variety of subjects. She 
enjoyed nature, and wrote of it, though Emerson is right in 
saying that her ^^raptures'' are somewhat "sickly and super- 
ficial.'' She had much to say of art, to which she was perhaps 
drawn by her study of Goethe, but her judgments are erratic. 
The same is true in a lesser degree of her literary criticism. 
Many of her writings are significant as indications of the 
transcendental view of things, but few of them deserve preser- 
vation for either content or manner. Much more interesting 
is the memoir in which Emerson, Channing, and James Free- 
man Clarke join their reminiscences and interpretations of 
her life and work. 

Theodore Parker (1810-1860) was the most active practi- 
cal reformer among the transcendentalists. His father was 

unable to send him to college, but he took the 
Parker^^* entrance examinations at Harvard and studied 

by himself for four years, coming up from his 
home in Lexington, Massachusetts, to pass the examinations 
with each class. As he had not been in residence and had 



The Central Period 249 

paid no tuition^ he did not receive his bachelor's degree. After 
completing a course at the Harvard Divinity school he became 
minister of the Unitarian church at West Eoxbnry^ Massa- 
chusetts. His radicalism was soon apparent and older min- 
isters of his denomination shunned him. In 1845 he began 
to preach in Boston, where he continued until just before his 
death. Though denied fellowship by other Unitarian churches 
he attracted a large congregation, and became known as a 
great pulpit orator and lyceum lecturer. He was active in all 
reforms, but especially in the anti-slavery movement. He 
aided fugitive slaves, incited mobs to rescue negroes from the 
hands of the authorities, secured arms to send to Kansas, and 
was privy to part, at least, of John Brown's plans for his 
Virginia campaign. His writings were numerous. He con- 
tributed several papers to the "Dial,'' and, beginning in 1849, 
conducted for three years the "Massachusetts Quarterly Re- 
view." His complete works, published in Boston and London 
after his death, include sermons, lectures, and suggestive 
articles on many themes. 

Parker was a persistent and energetic student, and he had 
remarkable powers of acquisition. He knew something of 

twenty different languages, and he had made 
Attai^^^ ts some investigations in most departments of 

knowledge, particularly those relating to phi- 
losophy. He had the power which belongs to a self-educated 
man with a vast store of facts which he can command and use 
at will. The calm patience of the scholar or the higher tastes 
of the man of culture he did not have. He wrote that he 
would rather have been a Franklin than a Michael Angelo. 
His sense of literature as well as of other arts was uncertain. 
His own works, though they are always forcible and show the 
rare power of introducing numerous facts and allusions with- 
out the appearance of pedantry, are often slightly bombastic, 
and lack reserve and sustained dignity of tone. 



250 American Literature 

Unitarianism changed rapidly in Parker's lifetime, and 
when he died those who had earlier denied him fellowship were 

ready to build his tomb as that of a prophet. 

His biography has several times been written, 
his works are still published, and the centenary of his birth 
was widely observed. He was an attractive and forceful man, 
able and sincere, and he contributed something to the develop- 
ment of religious thought. In American letters he was a 
striking and picturesque rather than an important figure. 

George Eipley (1803-1880) was born in Greenfield, Massa- 
chusetts, was graduated at Harvard in 1823, and after com- 
r p* 1 pleting his divinity course became pastor 

of a newly organized Unitarian church in Bos- 
ton. He was a thorough student, and soon came to be re- 
garded as one of the scholars of the transcendental movement. 
His devotion to the new ideas was not wholly approved by his 
church, and he resigned his pastorate to become the leader in 
the Brook Farm Association. In all his work he was greatly 
assisted by his wife, who was a woman of remarkable person- 
ality. Both Mr. and Mrs. Eipley devoted themselves with 
equal earnestness to the speculative and the practical questions 
involved in the new scheme. Both did their share of manual 
labor and taught in the school. Eipley's devotion to the 
community continued to the last, and when failure came he 
assumed the debts that remained, and sold his extensive 
private library to meet them. For a time he conducted at 
New York the ^^Harbinger,'' which had been founded by the 
Brook Farm community as an organ of Fourierism. When 
this failed Horace Greeley, who had been interested in Brook 
Farm, made him literary editor of the "New York Tribune,^' 
a position that he held to his death. He also did much mis- 
cellaneous writing and with C. A. Dana edited the New 
American Cyclopcedia. 

Eipley is important for his connection with Brook Farm 



The Central Period 351 

and kindred movements, and for his later work as literary 
critic on the ^^New York Tribune/^ When he accepted his 

position on the ^"Tribune^^ no daily newspaper 

in the country gave a scholarly and dignified 
discussion of literary matters. Though he was not a great 
critic, his taste was sound, his reading wide, and his scholar- 
ship thorough, and he made his department a model for other 
journals. He is, however, to be remembered for his influence, 
not for his achievements. A projected collection of his essays 
and reviews was never published and only the curious student 
is likely to read his writings to-day. 

Among the minor poets of transcendentalism were Christo- 
pher P. Cranch, Jones Very, and William Ellery Channing. 

Cranch (1813-1892) was born in Virginia, 
Minor Poets ^^g graduated from Harvard, and during the 
Channing ' early years of the transcendental movement 

was a clergyman. Later he withdrew from the 
ministry, studied art in Italy and Prance, lived for a time in 
New York, and returned to Cambridge, where he died in 
1892. His poems of the transcendental period were mostly 
short lyrics, of which the best is the "Stanzas^^ published in 
the ^^DiaV^ beginning: 

Thought is deeper than all speech, 
Feeling deeper than all thought. 

Later he published a translation of Virgil, some tales for 
children, and other writings. Jones Very (1813-1880) was 
born in Salem and after graduation from Harvard was tutor 
in that institution. He became afflicted, however, with a re- 
ligious monomania that interfered with his career. Though 
licensed to preach he never had a congregation, and after 
the transcendental excitement was over lived quietly until his 
death in 1880. The seven hundred poems in his collected 
works are all short, many of them being sonnets, and the ma- 



253 American Literature 

jority of them express his idealistic beliefs. They are smooth, 
and delicate in manner, and some of them still hold their 
places in the anthologies ; but the author is more likely to be 
remembered as another erratic member of Emerson^s circle 
than as a poet. William Ellery Channing (1818-1901), fre- 
quently known as Ellery Channing to distinguish him from 
his more eminent uncle of the same name, was a native of 
Boston. He attended Harvard college for a time, went west 
for two or three years, and engaged in editorial work in New 
York and elsewhere. His wife was a sister of Margaret Fuller, 
and he was intimate with Thoreau, whose biography he wrote. 
His friends felt that he had the temperament and the insight 
of a true poet ; and some of his verses strike a purer note than 
those of Cranch or Very, though they are usually not well 
sustained. 

Among the early transcendentalists who afterward became 
practical men of affairs were George William Curtis (1824- 

1892) and Charles A. Dana (1819-1897). 

Both were contributors to the ^^DiaF^ and resi- 
dents at Brook Farm, and after the failure of that experiment 
both removed to New York and engaged in editorial work. 
The former will be considered among the New York writers. 
Dana^s later work, which included many years of editorial 
writing for the New York "Tribune'^ and the ^^Sun,^^ and the 
editing with Eipley of the New American Cyclopcedia, is less 
important. His early verses and some prose work in the 
"DiaF^ and the ^^Harbinger'^ show an idealism and aspiration 
not to be suspected from his later career. 

Orestes A. Brownson (1803-1876), who during his life- 
time dallied with most of the faiths, religious and political, 
known in America, was a transcendentalist during the central 
years of the movement. When a young man he joined the 
Presbyterian church, but a few years later he was a IJni- 
versalist minister and editor of a Universalist journal. He 



The Central Period 253 

next transferred his allegiance to the Unitarians. After 
serving some time in the ministry of that denomination he 

became a transcendent alist^ and from 1836 
M"i<>^ to 1843 was pastor of the Society for Christian 

wSs''^^''*^^ Union and Progress in Boston. From 1844 

until his death he was a communicant of the 
Eoman Catholic Church, though his orthodoxy was often 
questioned by the American Catholic clergy. He was active 
in politics, much of the time as a member of the Democratic 
party, but often independent. In 1838 he founded the 
"Boston Quarterly Eeview;'^ and after he became a Catholic 
he edited "Brownson^s Quarterly Eeview.^^ Besides his maga- 
zine and review articles he published Charles Elwood, or The 
Infidel Converted, a novel, in 1840, The Spirit-Rapper, an 
Autobiography, in 1854, and several other works on religion, 
philosophy, and questions of the day. Of these Charles El- 
wood is the only one of importance in which he takes the 
transcendental point of view. He was an occasional attendant 
at the meetings of the Symposium, and the contributors to 
the "Boston Quarterly Eeview^^ were in some cases the same as 
those of the "Dial.^^ Brownson was a born controversialist, 
and no matter what his position might be at the time, he sup- 
ported it with cleverness and some ability. His frequent 
changes of party and church did much to discredit him, and 
his ideas were often not taken seriously. His style was well 
adapted to temporary controversy, but it was too flippant and 
uncertain in manner to ensure a lasting reputation for the 
author. James Freeman Clarke (1810-1888) was another 
transcendentalist. Unitarian clergyman, and versatile author 
whose fame as a man of letters is by no means commensurate 
with his influence while living. He founded the Church of 
the Disciples in Boston, and became known as a transcen- 
dentalist, an abolitionist, and an advocate of woman's suffrage 
and other reforms. In later years he was often spoken of as 



254 American Literature 

the leader of the Unitarian church in America. His numer- 
ous published works include many sermons, popular essays 
on theological subjects, some translations, and several histori- 
cal and biographical works. His book on Ten Great Religions 
attracted considerable attention. A later work. The Legend 
of Tliomas Didymus, the Jewish Sceptic, was an attempt to 
vivify and reconcile the gospel stories by means of an imagi- 
nary narrative credited to Thomas. The book is unsatisfac- 
tory; and indeed the author is rarely successful in anything 
but sermons and popular religious tracts. 

III. The New England Abolitionists 

The belief in the unrighteousness of human slavery, which 

finally resulted in the Emancipation Proclamation, did not 

originate in N^ew England. It had been de- 

e o ion veloping for generations throughout the civi- 
lized world, and in the early part of the nine- 
teenth century was generally diffused. More enlightened 
thinkers in the South, as well as those in the North, con- 
demned the institution until changing economic conditions 
and resentment at what they considered unwarranted inter- 
ference with local affairs forced them to support theories 
which at bottom they did not really believe. Both circum- 
stances and temperament united, however, to make the de- 
scendants of the New England Puritans the leaders in the 
movement for wider human freedom. At first the North 
realized the practical difficulties of emancipation, as the South 
realized its theoretical desirability. But about the beginning 
of the period now under consideration a few persons began 
to emphasize the moral at the expense of the practical aspects 
of the question, and to call for immediate abolition. At first 
these radicals were condemned in the North as bitterly as in 
the South. Business advantage and a more laudable hesi- 
tancy to interfere in the affairs of other states led most citi- 



The Central Period 255 

zens to resent any inflammatory utterances against slavery; 
and the lower and more selfish classes of the community carried 
their resentment against the reformers to the point of perse- 
cution. The early transcendentalists had to withstand ridi- 
cule and supercilious unbelief; the early abolitionists were 
forced to endure social ostracism, and even physical violence. 
The revolution which changed the feeling toward the abo- 
litionists from abhorrence to honor came partly from an 
awakening of the public conscience, and partly from the 
political and economic developments that drove N'orth and 
South into extreme opposing positions. This change was 
accomplished first in New England and was hastened by a 
great number and variety of writings by New England men. 
All the transcendentalists who have been mentioned, with 
the partial exception of Brownson, were in sj^mpathy with the 

anti-slavery agitation. Some of them, notably 
. ®.. . . Emerson, felt that they had other messages to 

bear, and declined to take a very active part 
in abolition meetings and organizations; others were equally 
notable as anti-slavery workers and as transcendentalists. 
Parker and Clarke not only preached abolitionism, but per- 
sonally aided in the rescue and secretion of runaway slaves. 
Dana, especially after he took up newspaper work in New 
York, was a strong supporter of the anti-slavery crusade. 
There was also a number of men, less speculative and mystical 
than the transcendentalists, whose chief energies were devoted 
to the abolition movement, and who fairly constitute a group 
of anti-slavery writers. 

One of the earliest and most influential of these writers, 
though by no means the most meritorious, was William Lloyd 

Garrison (1805-1879). He was a native of 
Garrison ^^ Massachusetts, and after he had served an 

apprenticeship on a local paper edited several 
minor journals, among them the ^^Genius of Universal Eman- 



256 American Literature 

cipation'^ at Baltimore. In 1831 he founded the ^^Liberator'^ 
at Boston, and he continued to edit it and to speak and write 
for abolition until his end was accomplished. 

Garrison conducted his campaign, not by means of elaborate 
argument, but by the blunt and continued iteration of a few 
statements that he believed self-evident. His 
The Appeal of reasoning was simple. Starting with the pos- 
Writings tulate that all men are created free and equal, 

he argued that no man has a right to enslave 
another. Therefore, every slave is entitled to immediate 
emancipation regardless of consequences ; the man who with- 
holds due hire from the slave is a thief; and a Union based 
on a Constitution that recognizes an iniquity like slavery is 
accursed. The repetition of these ideas, expressed in the 
plainest language, on almost every page of Garrison^s writings 
is inartistic, and to the man who thinks of expediency seems 
fanatical; but the very fact that it irritates makes it forcible. 
This force is increased by a certain earnestness and dignity 
that pervades even the most bitter passages. There is harsh 
language in abundance, but it is never blackguardism, and 
rarely personal vituperation. It is because his utterances, 
extreme and impractical as they were, contained a grain of 
uncomfortable truth, that Garrison was hated, reviled, and 
mobbed, and in the end brought men to his side. His personal 
courage, his unceasing application, and his power of striking 
expression made him one of the most important forces in 
bringing about emancipation. In the literary history of the 
country he holds only the minor place accorded to a forceful 
pamphleteer. 

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892), the chief poet of the 
anti-slavery movement, was born in Haverhill, 
Whittfer^'"''^''^ Massachusetts. Unlike the other more promi- 
nent literary men of New England he was a 
representative of the uncultured rural class. His ancestors 



The Central Period 257 

were Quaker fanners who had quietly tilled the same home- 
stead since 1647, and had occupied the house in which he was 
born since 1688. Whittier^s own childhood was spent in the 
hard labor that devolved on a New England farmer^s boy, 
varied by attendance at brief winter terms of country school. 
When about fourteen years of age he made the acquaintance 
of Burns^s poems and was inspired to write verses of his own. 
A familiar story relates that one of these rhymed effusions 
was sent to a local paper, and that the editor, William Lloyd 
Garrison, rode to the Whittier home to see the young con- 
tributor, and to urge him to continue his education. The 
elder Whittier had a conservative Quaker farmer's distrust of 
superfluous learning, but his prejudices were so far overcome 
that the son spent two winters at Haverhill academy, earning 
his own expenses by shoe-making and teaching. Here he 
gained the rudiments of French and somewhat greater famili- 
arity with English literature. 

Through the influence of Garrison, Whittier secured in 1828 
the editorship of the ^^American Manufacturer,'' published at 
Boston. Later he edited for brief periods of 
Ab rf ^^ *^t ^™^ weekly papers at Haverhill and at Hart- 

ford, Connecticut. Poor health, which 
throughout life interfered with his activities, and the cir- 
cumstances of his family induced him to return to the farm 
in 1832. In 1836 the old homestead was sold, and he re- 
moved to the village of Amesbury, which was his permanent 
residence until his death. Meanwhile he had become, through 
Garrison's influence, an abolitionist, had published in 1833 
a pamphlet on slavery entitled Justice and Expediency, and 
was taking an active part in the anti-slavery propaganda. 

This devotion to an unpopular cause had a radical effect 
on both his worldly and his literary career. It blasted his 
political future, which is said to have been promising, and 
it changed the character of his writings. Before this he had 



258 American Literature 

aflEected the manner of Byron and Scott, and had published 
many poems in newspapers and magazines. In 1831 he had 
collected a series of sketches first contributed to the "New 
England Magazine/^ and issued them as 

Early Writings 



^ ^®^^ Legends of New England, and the next year 



he published a long narrative poem, "Moll 

Pitcher/^ These early writings, almost all of which were 

suppressed in later life, :are intrinsically unimportant, but 

they indicate how different might have been his literary 

career if he had not deliberately given himself for thirty 

years to the anti-slavery cause. 

Poor health and limited financial circumstances restricted 

Whittier^s activities, but he gave to the abolition movement 

all the energy that he possessed. He con- 

A • ^!^o^ ^^ ducted for .a short time an abolitionist paper in 
Against Slavery , . . ^ ^ 

Philadelphia, where his office was destroyed 
by a mob, and he was threatened with personal violence ; and 
from time to time he did editorial work on other papers. 
When new occasions arose he put in verse the feelings of his 
party. Nor was he useful merely as a writer. He believed in 
accomplishing results by any honorable means, and he became 
associated with the "New Movement,^^ opposed in method to 
Garrison and others who refused to exercise political privi- 
leges under a government that tolerated slavery. The 
qualities which had made his own political prospects bright 
while he was a conservative still served him, and he took an 
active and often effective part in the work of conventions, 
committees, and other organizations. His Quaker faith pre- 
vented him from approving the war as such, but he seems to 
have felt that it was necessary, and he rejoiced in the result. 
Whittier never married. Certain poems which he charac- 
terized as "subjective and reminiscent'^ imply that he had 
loved, but such was his reserve that his biographers have not 
succeeded in learning much regarding his affections, or even 



The Central Period 259 

in identifying their object or objects with certainty. One 
reason for his celibacy was probably his financial circum- 
stances, and his feeling of obligation to his mother and sister. 

His health prevented him from engaging in 
w ittiers regular remunerative work, and it was not 

until after the war that his copyrights yielded 
enough to relieve him from anxiety over business affairs. He 
was a man with few intimates, and these were mostly in the 
humbler walks of life. With the members of the Boston lit- 
erary set he was on terms of pleasant acquaintanceship, but 
nothing more. His relations with James T. Fields and 
Bayard Taylor, whom he associates with himself in his poem, 
^^The Tent on the Beach,^^ were somewhat closer. Probably 
some of his neighbors in the little village of Amesbury knew 
him best. His closest friends outside his own social class 
were women. 

The frequency of Whittier's publications suggests the ra- 
pidity and fluency with which he wrote. Besides the early 

works already mentioned he published ^^Mogg 

SoUfic Writer ^^S^^^/' ^ ^^^S narrative poem, in 1836, and 
collections of poems in 1837, 1838, 1840, 1843, 
1846, 1849, 1850, 1853, 1856, 1860, 1864, and 1865, besides 
several volumes of prose, and many articles in periodicals. 
When the ^^ Atlantic Monthly^^ was founded he became one of 
the contributors. His volumes published before 1865 contain 
some of his best miscellaneous work, but throughout almost all 
of them the anti-slavery element is prominent, and in many 
it predominates. 

Although he was interested in woman's suffrage and other 
reforms his heart was bound up only in the abolition move- 
ment, and when this was accomplished he became less of a 
propagandist and more of a man of letters. At the close of 
the war he was, however, nearly sixty years old, and his lit- 
erary manner was well formed. He continued to write pro- 



260 American Literature 

fusely until his death, publishing ^^Snow-Bound^' in 1866, 
"The Tent on the Beach^' in 1867, and other volumes of 
verse in 1869, 1870, 1871, 1872, 1875, 1876, 1878, 1881, 
1883, 1886, and 1892, besides a revised edition of his complete 
writings in 1888-9, and some miscellaneous work. If an in- 
creased proportion of his better poems is found in the late vol- 
umes it is because he gave more time to themes of permanent 
importance, rather than because of any great development. 
The habit of writing rapidly and with little revision had be- 
come fixed, and he was too old to break it. He attempted no 
new forms and acquired but little greater skill in the old ones. 
Whittier^s favorite themes, aside from those connected with 
slavery, were events in the early history of New England, 

especially the persecution of the Quakers and 
Whittier's -t^g witches; Indian legends; the simple life 

Poems ^^ rural New England; and religious doubt 

and belief. The anti-slavery poems were mostly 
inspired by particular events — "editorials in verse,^^ they have 
been aptly called. Their lack of interest now is due in part 
to the qualities that once made them effective — their intensity 
and their pertinency to questions of immediate timely inter- 
est. It must be remembered, however, that they were the best 
of the innumerable verses on similar themes. Even to-day 
it is impossible to read "The Hunters of Men,^^ with its 
sarcasm and scorn, or "Massachusetts to Virginia,^^ with its 
impassioned indignation, and not feel something of the stirring 
of the old conflict. Nominally in this group of poems, though 
different in character and quality, are "Ichabod^^ in which 
he expressed his grief at what he felt to be the apostasy of 
Webster, and "Laus Deo,^^ his noble hymn of thanksgiving 
over the fall of slavery. 

It is in his narrative poems that Whittier shows the great- 
est development. His early ambition was to write long nar- 
rative poems on American themes. This was, however, be- 



The Central Period 261 

yond his powers. Both ^^Mogg Megone'^ and "Moll Pitcher^' 
were failures; and the author turned to the form of verse in 

which he excelled, the short and simple ballad. 
Whittier's The majority of his ballads, like "Mabel 

l^mT^ Martin/^ "Skipper Ireson^s Eide/' "Barbara 

Frietchie/^ and most of the tales in "The Tent 
on the Beach/^ have an historical or legendary origin, but 
some of the most effective, such as "Telling the Bees'^ and 
"Maud MuUer/^ are creations of fancy expressing some ele- 
mental emotional experience. All those mentioned are 
simple stories simply told; "The Sisters^^ shows that if need 
be he could produce a dramatic effect. 

Whittier^s powers of description are seen to advantage in 
the narrative poems. His handling of descriptive background 

in poems like "Telling the Bees^^ is unsur- 

Whittier's passed, if not unequalled, in American verse. 

owers of jj^g purely objective poems of nature are 

hardly as good; but some of those in which 
there is a strong subjective element must be ranked, with his 
ballads, as his j&nest work. Such are "Sunset on the Bear- 
Camp,'' "The Eiver Path,'' "A Sea Dream," "The Barefoot 
Boy," and, greatest of all, "Snow-Bound." In these, as in the 
ballads, the chief characteristic is absolute naturalness and 
fidelity to nature and to human life, without reference to 
artificial conventionalities. Everywhere in Whittier as in 
Burns the reader is struck by conversational turns of phrase, 
homely figures of speech, which would be fatal if used with 
the slightest affectation, but which constitute one of the 
chief charms of the verse. 

God's colors all are fast, 

from "Sunset on the Bear-Camp" may serve as an illustration. 

The religious verses are not great poetry, but they express 

the genuine spiritual emotions of a simple and devout man. 



363 American Literature 

Quakerism, long a despised faith, found itself in many re- 
spects in harmony with the new transcendental spirit of 
New England, and the poef s expressions of 
Whittier's quiet trust in the Divine had an especial 

e gious charm for those who had reached a belief in the 

Verse 

Inner Light by the troubled way of German 

philosophy. Whittier's true attitude is indicated by the 

familiar stanza from "The Eternal Goodness :^^ 

I know not where His islands lift 

Their fronded palms in air ; 
I only know I cannot drift 

Beyond His love and care. 

In other poems he showed just enough questioning to prove 
that he was intellectually alert in the midst of the nineteenth 
century; but serious religious doubt he probably never felt. 
His fondness for subjects connected with the Holy Land is 
a curious illustration of his old-fashioned attitude toward 
religious matters. It is noticeable that though he was a 
Quaker the hymnbooks of most denominations contain more 
of his hymns than of those by any other American poet. 

The three volumes of prose in Whittier's collected writings 
contain some meritorious work, but little that would have 

been reprinted if it had not been for the 
^^^** w' Y author's reputation as a poet. Most important 

from a literary standpoint is ^^Margaret 
Smith's Journal,'' a painstaking piece of work which aims to 
recreate, by means of a slight fictitious narrative, something 
of colonial New England. It introduces the author's favorite 
topics of slavery, the Quakers, and the Indians, and its thread 
of tragic romance implies a provincial distrust of those who 
came from the gayer social life of England. Some of the 
lighter sketches, such as ''Yankee Gypsies," and ''The Fish I 
didn't Catch," are pleasant reading. The author's first anti- 
slavery utterance, "Justice and Expediency," is in a height- 



The Central Period 263 

ened oratorical manner, and presents both the moral and 
the practical arguments against slavery with great intensity. 
The Portraits, Sketches, Historical Papers, Criticisms, 
etc., are mostly unimportant articles collected from maga- 
zines. 

In both his limitations and his excellences Whittier was 
representative of rural New England. In many ways his life 

was narrow. He never travelled. His educa- 
r ?T^ tipn as a boy was slight and he never owed 

much to books. Most of the greater works of 
English literature influenced him little and those of other 
literatures not at all. His Quaker training restricted him in 
many ways. He had no knowledge or appreciation of music ; 
he never entered a theatre; he seems to have cared little for 
painting and sculpture; and it is doubtful if he ever fully 
appreciated the value of form in poetry. His own metres are 
simple and few in number, and he rarely attempted anything 
so slightly artificial as the sonnet. He had a characteristic 
love of the didactic, and showed his limitations in the remark 
that the ^Tsalm of Lif e'^ was ^Vorth more than all the dreams 
of Shelley and Keats and Wordsworth.^^ Indeed, the fact 
that his moral was stronger than his artistic sense :accounts 
directly and indirectly for his chief deficiencies, his common- 
places, his careless rhymes, and all the crudities due to haste 
and lack of revision. 

Whittier's good qualities were equally typical of his class and 
his environment. He had the seeing eye and the feeling for 

the picturesque that are natural to a race of 
ExceUences intelligent men who know life from observation 

rather than from books. He had all the ISTew 
England shrewdness, idealism, belief in democracy, and devo- 
tion to truth. From these characteristics came his accuracy 
and vividness in description, his knack of story-telling, his 
mastery of the forms of language and of verse that make 



264 American^ Literature 

a strong, simple appeal, and the high moral quality that is 
everywhere present in his poems. 

It is because New England ideals have, in the course of 
national development, become common to so many sections 

of the country that Whittier has good claim 
Ameiic^%oQt^ ^^ ^^ called the most representative American 

poet. Though the life detailed in ^^Snow- 
Bound'^ and "Maud MuUer'^ is long a thing of the past, a 
large part of the American people still hold the Quaker 
farmer's ideas of the independence and dignity of labor, and 
still feel, though reason may tell them differently, that a union 
between the Judge and the barefoot maiden would have been 
neither impractical nor unwise. Conditions change, and 
Americans are no doubt coming to read "Maud MuUer'^ as 
Englishmen read of King Cophetua and the beggar maid. 
For the many who have taken it, or still take it, as a literal 
commentary on life, Whittier has spoken better than any other 
poet. 

The author's personality also aided in giving him the char- 
acter of a national representative. Strong as was his indig- 
nation over slavery, and bitter as were his denunciations, he 
never seemed to be actuated by selfish motives, or to harbor 
personal ill-feeling. His desire to do absolute justice is illus- 
trated by his care that "Ichabod'' should be followed in his 
poems by "The Lost Occasion,'' in which he expresses a more 
charitable opinion of Webster; and by the note in which he 
showed his anxiety lest "Skipper Ireson's Eide" might per- 
petuate a tradition that did injustice to a man long dead. 
Probably no other abolitionist uttered such strong words and 
aroused so little personal hostility. His gentleness, his obvi- 
ous genuineness, his dignified simplicity, his adherence to the 
forms of Quakerism, even his bachelor loneliness, separated 
him from other men, and made him appear as the world feels 
a poet should; and as the man shows in all his works, these 



The Central Period 265 

same characteristics still seem to make him typical of the best 
in old New England^ if not in the nation at large. 

The greatest orator of the anti-slavery canse^ Wendell Phil- 
lips (1811-1884), was the descendant of an old and aristo- 
cratic New England family. He was gradu- 
^ ^ ated from Harvard college and Harvard law 
school, and opened an office in Boston. When he identified 
himself with the abolitionists he fnlly realized that he was 
sacrificing social position and professional success. He first 
attracted attention in 1837 when at a meeting in Paneuil 
Hall he made a sudden and dramatic reply to a speech by the 
attorney-general of the commonwealth^ who had defended 
the mobbing of Lovejoy, an abolitionist editor in Illinois. 
Erom this time until emancipation was secured he was 
constantly active, speaking wherever he could be heard. Be- 
sides his anti-slavery addresses he delivered lyceum lectures 
on other topics. Even before the close of the war he was 
interested in woman's suffrage and teetotalism, and after the 
slave was freed he supported various extreme theories of 
reform. 

As an abolitionist Wendell Phillips excites admiration for 
the moral and physical courage that he displayed, and deserves 
credit for accomplishing much in behalf of his cause. As 
an orator he had, according to tradition, wonderful infiuence 
over an audience. As a man of letters he was of less im- 
portance. It is, indeed, hard to see on reading his speeches 
what constituted their power. They usually begin tactfully; 
some of them, like that on Toussaint FOuverture, contain 
highly wrought passages much m vogue for school and college 
declamations; and a few, like the plea for the removal of 
Judge Loring, show skilful and logical reasoning. Most of 
them, however, appeal to the prejudices of the hearers, and 
are only clever and rather specious in argument, though ap- 
parently the work of a man who was not deliberately insincere. 



266 American Literature 

His most famous lyceum lecture not on a controversial topic, 
^^The Lost Arts/^ contains some history and science, partly 
false, so stated as to produce an eminently heightened effect. 
Indeed, many of his addresses give the reader an impression 
of unintentional distortion to make an effective case. 

J^mes Eussell Lowell (1819-1891) belongs partly to the 
anti-slavery writers and partly to the group of New Eng- 

landers who were in the largest sense men of 
James ussell Jitters. His interests were wide, and he wrote 

on many themes; but he gave, though not 
quite so completely as Whittier, some of his best years to the 
support of abolitionism. He was born in Cambridge in 1819, 
almost a half-generation after the other N'ew England writers 
of first rank. His family was one of considerable distinction. 
One member founded the town of Lowell, Massachusetts, 
another established the Lowell Institute in Boston. His 
father was pastor of the West Church, Boston. James Eussell 
Lowell was the youngest of six children. He inherited from 
his mother an imaginative disposition, and he grew fond of 
reading imaginative books — among the earliest being Scott^s 
tales and the Faerie Queen. He was fortunate in having 
among his playmates boys like the Danas, William Wetmore 
Story, and Thomas Wentworth Higginson. In 1834 he en- 
tered Harvard college, where he read much in his own fashion, 
formed friends among the literary set, and edited the col- 
lege magazine, but neglected such of his studies as were un- 
attractive to him. The faculty showed him the leniency with 
which faculties are likely to treat a bright and wholesome 
boy who insists on doing things in his own way, but at la&t 
his record grew too bad. It was apparently the sum of many 
minor delinquencies rather than any one serious act that led 
to his "rustication^^ in his senior year. This old-fashioned 
punishment consisted in placing the culprit in the family of 
some scholarly country clerg}nnan, who furnished board, lodg- 



The Central Period 267 

ing^ instruction, and exhortation. In this case the place of 
banishment was Concord. 

After receiving a degree Lowell hesitated in the choice of a 
profession. He considered the ministry, law, business, even 

medicine. The final decision was law, and he 
Maria White — ^^s graduated from the Harvard Law school 
Encasement ^^ 1840. In college he had been a careless, 

sentimental youth, with a tendency to be 
mildly satirical, perhaps to affect the blase. While at Concord 
he had refused to take Emerson seriously, and in his class-day 
poem had satirized him and the abolitionists. He would 
inevitably have changed as- he became older, but the change 
was hastened by his acquaintance with Maria White. This 
young woman was of the more spiritual New England type, 
a writer of verses, and a reformer who dared at that early 
date to appear on the public platform, yet who kept the most 
perfect modesty and girlish womanliness. Lowell had met her 
while he was agitated over the choice of a profession, and 
about the time of his graduation from the law school they 
became engaged. It is significant of the young people them- 
selves and of the idyllic society in which they lived that their 
love-letters were passed about among their many friends that 
others might enjoy their happiness. 

Miss White stimulated Lowell to greater literary productive- 
ness and interested him in the anti-slavery reform. His first 

volume of verse, which appeared a year after 
UUra^WoX *^^^^^ betrothal with the significant title of 

A Year's Life, consisted mostly of love poems. 
But few of these have been preserved in the author^s collected 
works. At this time he was nominally practicing law, but 
really occupying himself with contributing to the magazines 
and lecturing a little. Besides poems he published a series 
of papers on the ^^Old English Dramatists^^ in the ^^Boston 
Miscellany,'' and a prose tale, ''My first Client.'' In 1843 he 



268 American Literature 

joined with his friend Eobert Carter in founding a magazine 
of his own, "The Pioneer/^ This lasted but three months, 
and left the proprietors in debt, but it is valuable as illustrat- 
ing the remarkable selective ability which Lowell always 
showed as an editor. The three numbers contain contributions 
by Poe, Story, Hawthorne, Neal, Jones Very, and others then 
inconspicuous who have since won fame. 

In 1844 Lowell was married, and lived for the winter in 
Philadelphia and afterward at the family home, Blmwood, 
in Cambridge. He had little money, and like Hawthorne in 
the early days of his married life found it difficult to make 
ends meet. In the year of his marriage he published another 
collection of poems, containing among others "Prometheus"^ 
and the "Legend of Brittany.^^ The next year he issued his 
first volume of prose, Conversations on some of the Old Poets, 
In 1846 he became a regular contributor to the "Anti- 
Slavery Standard,^^ and in this year he wrote the first of the 
"Biglow Papers.^^ These were published in newspapers, and in 
1848 collected into a volume. The year 1848, the most im- 
portant in Lowell's literary life, also saw the publication of 
the "Fable for Critics,^' "The Vision of Sir LaunfaV' and 
another volume of poems. In the hope of reviving Mrs. 
Lowell's failing health the family went abroad in 1851, 
but the benefit was slight, and she died in 1853. Pour chil- 
dren had been born to them, of whom but one survived the 
mother. The record of these joys and sorrows may be traced 
in some of the father's finest poems. 

In 1855 James Eussell Lowell was chosen to deliver the 
Lowell Institute lectures at Boston, and the indirect result 
of his success was his appointment to succeed 
Lowell Longfellow as Smith professor of modern 

H^vard^ ^* languages and literatures at Harvard. Before 
entering upon his duties he went abroad to 
study, spending most of his time in Germany. In 1857 he 



The Central Period 269 

was married to Miss Frances Dunlap. The same year he 
became editor of the "Atlantic Monthly.'^ 

The "Atlantic Monthly^^ was planned as a medium of ex- 
pression for the literary men of New England who were in sym- 
pathy with the new movements for reform and 
M^l ^^^ ^^^ social tendencies. Among its early 

contributors were Longfellow, Whittier, Emer- 
son, Holmes, J. T. Trowbridge, T. W. Higginson, Mrs. Stowe, 
and a little later Hawthorne and many others. Before this 
time the only important New England magazine had been the 
"North American Eeview,^^ and this, through fear of injur- 
ing its subscription list, had become a trimmer on all political 
and social questions. Under Lowell^s editorship the "At- 
lantic^^ at once achieved a preeminence never before or since 
attained by an American magazine, and for many years after- 
ward represented what was best in American literature. 

Lowell retained the editorship of the "Atlantic'^ until 
1861, when he surrendered it to James T. Fields, of the firm 
of Ticknor and Fields, which had purchased 
Lowell's ^ the magazine. In 1863 he became one of the 

to Magazines editors of the "North American Eeview,^^ and 
succeeded in making it a live periodical with 
real opinions. His prose contributions to the "Atlantic^^ and 
the "North American'^ were both literary and political, the 
political being in the early years the more important. Most of 
his greater critical essays were written after the war was 
finished, and reconstruction was well under way. Since the 
"North American'' did not publish verse his poems were 
printed in the "Atlantic.'' In 1862, after repeated solicita- 
tion, he began in the "Atlantic" a second series of "Biglow 
Papers," and continued them at intervals until 1866. 

In 1864 Lowell collected a volume of prose miscellanies 
which was issued as Fireside Travels— a fanciful title which, 
like those of later collections, was chosen by the publisher. 



270 American Literature 

not by the author. In 1865, at the services held in honor of 
the sons of Harvard who died in the Civil War, he read his 
"Commemoration Ode/^ considered by many 
WrTto ^s^^*^^ critics his poetical masterpiece. In 1868 ap- 
peared a collection entitled Under the Wil- 
lows, and in 1870 a long poem, The Cathedral. Two volumes 
of critical essays, the first series of Among my Books and 
My Study Windows, were published in 1870 and 1871 re- 
spectively. 

In 1872 Lowell resigned the editorship of the "North 
American Eeview,^^ secured a respite from his professorial 
duties, and went to Europe for two years. On 
Lowell's Ills return to America he wrote for the "Na- 

Activities tion^^ some satirical verse on the political 

morals of the country in which he came as 
near as his geniality allowed to showing ill-nature. This re- 
sulted in unpleasant criticism, and was the first occasion of 
the absurd charge, often repeated, that Lowell was losing his 
Americanism. In 1876 he took an active interest in the cam- 
paign, and was delegate to the national convention and presi- 
dential elector. After the election of President Hayes he was 
appointed minister to Spain, where he served for three years. 
In 1880 he was promoted to the Court of» Saint James, and 
represented the United States there until he was recalled by 
President Cleveland in 1885. In Spain he made an efficient 
minister, but was out of the main current of events. In Eng- 
land he succeeded as no American before him had done in 
being ambassador not only to the court but to the literary and 
social circles of the country. He developed great powers as 
an occasional speaker, and was everywhere in demand. 

The second Mrs. Lowell died in the year of his recall from 
England, and after his return to America he made his home 
with his married daughter, first at Southborough, Massachu- 
setts, then in the family residence at Elmwood. For the 



The Central Period 271 

summers he usually went to England. In 1887 he again de- 
livered the Lowell Institute lectures, choosing as a subject 
his favorite theme, the Old English Drama- 
Yerrs^^'^ ^^^* tists. These lectures were printed in 1893. 
Other late volumes were Democracy and 
other Addresses, 1886, Heartsease and Rue, 1888, Political 
Essays, 1888. For many years he had been troubled with 
gout, and after suffering hopelessly from a complication of 
troubles he died in 1891. He had almost prepared for the 
press another collection of essays, and this was issued soon 
after his death. In 1893 appeared two volumes of his let- 
ters edited by Charles Eliot K'orton. 

These volumes of letters give a delightful view of LowelFs 
life and personality, and afford the best means of knowing 
an author whose works can be appreciated 
P^^^ \tv ^^^^ ^^ those who have formed the acquaint- 

ance of the man himself. In boyhood he was 
bright and interesting, and already showed some of the traits 
of the man. In college he was one of those brilliant but ir- 
repressible youths who are admired not for what they do, but 
for what they are and what they seem capable of doing. At 
this early age he had developed the habits, which he always 
retained, of an omnivorous reader and a bibliophile. In these 
years and those just following he had great aspirations and 
great though not unpleasing confidence in himself. As his 
acquaintance with Maria White brought out what lay deeper 
in his nature he came to sympathize strongly with the anti- 
slavery movement, and sacrificed something by allying him- 
self with the unpopular cause. At this time he was a mystic, 
seeing visions, and even feeling that he received direct revela- 
tions from God. Life dealt somewhat harshly with him, and 
it is in connection with his troubles and sorrows that his sweet- 
ness of character is best shown. It is pathetic to note the 
change from his enthusiastic confidence in his future as a 



273 AMERiCAisr Literature 

poet to his questioning dissatisfaction with all his later work. 
There were no sudden transitions in his life^ but he passed 
gradually from the buoyant hopefulness of ^^The Vision of Sir 
LaunfaF^ and the rollicking humor of the ^^Fable for Critics^^ 
to a calmer though no less genial view of life. His diplomatic 
and social successes came in his later years^ the proper though 
unexpected reward of what had gone before. Through all 
he appears the same — ^whimsical^ kindly^ a man of the world in 
the better sense^ but as stern as his Puritan ancestors in his 
devotion to moral truth. 

Lowell^s earliest writing was in verse. He made rhymes 
in his boyhood, and in college his capabilities were recognized 

when he was chosen to write the class poem. 
Lowe s ar y jj^ ^^^ ^ student of the English poets, and his 

early work was often little more than a mosaic 

of phrases suggested by his reading. In the poems from his 

first volume the chief influence seems to be that of Tennyson. 

''The Sirens'^ suggests ''The Lotos-Eaters:'' 

The sea is lonely, the sea is dreary, 
The sea is restless and uneasy ; 
Thou seekest quiet, thou art weary, 
Wandering thou knowest not whither ; — 
Our little isle is green and breezy, 
Come and rest thee ! O come hither, 
Come to this peaceful home of ours, 

Where evermore 
The low west wind creeps panting up the shore 
To be at rest among the flowers ; 
Full of rest the green moss lifts, 

As the dark waves of the sea 
Draw in and out of rocky rifts. 
Calling solemnly to thee. 

There is even a closer imitation of Coleridge in, 

From the close-shut windows gleams no spark. 
The night is chilly, the night is dark ; 

and there are obvious echoes of Shelley, Keats, Southey, and 
others. This imitation grows less noticeable as time passes, 



The Central Period 273 

but some of the later poems suggest Browning and Matthew- 
Arnold. In the early published poems there is no touch of 
humor^ though the letters of this time show that Lowell often 
scribbled verses that were full of fun. There is much on love 
and woman, something on the grave problems of life and the 
mission of the poet, relatively little on nature. In the poems 
written between the appearance of A Years Life and the 
author^s flowering year of 1848 there is more variety, often 
more power. Here come ^Trometheus^^ with its radical 
democracy, ''To a * Pine-Tree,'' ''To the Dandelion,'' and 
"Beaver Brook'' with their nature descriptions, the ringing 
verses of "The Present Crisis," and the restrained expressions 
of personal grief in "The Changeling" and "She Came and 
Went." 

The earliest work to attract much public attention was the 
first series of the "Biglow Papers," begun in the "Boston 

Courier" in 1846, and continued in the 
The Biglow "Anti-Slavery Standard" until 1848. In 

F^^t^s""' their original form these were poems in 

the Yankee dialect satirizing the Mexican 
War and the policy that favored it. The elaborate set- 
ting in which these poems are now found was added when 
they were collected in 1848. Some of the best things in the 
"Papers" are in this later part — the "Notices of an Inde- 
pendent Press," the rambling introduction by the Eeverend 
Homer Wilbur, and the notes interspersed throughout. The 
additions, however, tend to obscure the fact that the original 
design was wholly political. As the "Papers" now stand they 
satirize log-rolling literary criticism, later tendencies in verse, 
the pedantry and mild weaknesses of the New England clergy, 
the popular enthusiasm for Carlyle, and many other things. 
The greatest fault is that there is too much of this added 
material. Lowell never knew when to stop fooling, once he 
had begun. No other writer ever prepared a whole glossary 



274 American Literature 

as a joke. It is a less se]:ious fault that the characters are 
none of them consistent. Birdofredom Sawin is so much of 
a clown that we hardly expect him to be true to real life. 
Hosea Biglow himself is always the same in his political be- 
liefs, but not in form of expression. His faults of spelling are 
much more exaggerated in some poems than in others, and oc- 
casional passages employ a learned diction quite impossible 
for a rustic like Hosea. Parson Wilbur shows the greatest 
inconsistencies of all. At times he is a ludicrous caricature 
of a narrow pedantic clergyman, at times a pathetic old con- 
servative, at times he is identical with Lowell himself. The 
use of dialect is explained partly by the author's interest in 
the peculiarities of local New England speech, partly by the 
fact that it gives greater freedom of expression. Audacities 
like those in the last lines of the following stanza would be 
intolerable in plain English: 

Ez fer war, I caU it murder, — 

There you hev it plain an' flat; 
I don't want to go no furder 

Than my Testyment fer that; 
God hez sed so plump an' fairly, 

It's ez long ez it is broad,' 
An' you've gut to git up airly 

Ef you want to take in God. 

Dialect was also favorable to the introduction of humor, al- 
ways a necessity in effective political satire. 

The second series of the "Biglow Papers'' differs from the 
first chiefly in being less spontaneous. The Lowell of 1862 

was more of a philologist and less of an en- 
SSn^ Series^ thusiastic reformer than the Lowell of 1846. 

The long introduction to the second series is 
signed by J. E. L. in his proper person, and is wholly serious. 
''The CourtinV LowelFs only important dialect poem outside 
the ''Biglow Papers'' proper, is repeated from the Introduction 
to the first series, carefully enlarged to nearly twice its original 



The Central Period 275 

bulk. The poems of the series as they appeared in the ^^At- 
lantic^^ show a tendency to wander from strictly political 
themes, as if to experiment with the possibilities of dialect 
verse. Indeed, certain pastoral and descriptive passages were 
adapted from an abandoned narrative poem, ^^The Nooning.'^ 
The extravagances attributed to Birdofredom Sawin seem, to 
a later day reader, less pleasing than those of the earlier series. 
Some effective lines of Yankee colloquialisms are, however, 
unexcelled. ^^ Jonathan to John^^ is full of them : 

Who made the law thet hurts, John, 

Heads I win, — ditto tails? 
"J. ^." was on his shirts, John, 

Onless my memory fails. 

We own the ocean, tu, John : 

You mus'n' take it hard, 
Ef we can't think with you, John, 

It's jest your own back-yard. 
Ole Uncle S. sez he, **I guess, 

Ef thefs his claim," sez he, 
"The fencin'-stuff'U cost enough 

To bust up friend J. B., 

Ez wal ez you an' me !" 

The ^^Fable for Critics^^ illustrates two of the author^s chief 

characteristics — his ability to form a correct estimate of an 

author from his early work, and his inability 

e a e or ^^ ^^^p joking when the reader has had enough. 
The parts of the work best known are the 
critical estimates of contemporary writers. A few of these 
show personal bias — Lowell over-praises his fellow-abolition- 
ist Mrs. Child, he shows his personal dislike of Margaret 
Puller, and he is rather patronizing in his attitude toward the 
Knickerbocker writers. Most of his judgments are, however, 
those of posterity, though often, as in case of Hawthorne, he 
was characterizing writers who had not done their best work. 
It is doubtful if many persons read the whole poem, with its 



276 American Literature 

rhymed title-page and preface, and its rambling fable of 
Apollo, into which are brought innumerable puns, and discus- 
sions of all sorts of things, even capital punishment. On every 
page are clever lines, but the whole is too long and too hard 
to follow. 

There is a striking difference between the "Vision of Sir 
LaunfaV^ which also appeared in 1848, and either the "Big- 
low Papers^^ or the "Fable for Critics.^^ The 
S^ISal^^ "Vision^' was undoubtedly suggested by Ten- 
nyson^s treatment of the Grail legend. Its 
great popularity is due to its obvious moralizing and to the 
presence of some fine nature-descriptions. It is, however, 
lacking in originality of both idea and expression, and it 
shows great unevenness of execution. In the famous pas- 
sage on June there are prosaic lines like. 

The jflush of life may well be seen ; 
and close to the perfect characterization. 

Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, 
is the ridiculous metaphor: 

But the wind without was eager and sharp, 
Of Sir LaunfaFs gray hair it makes a harp. 

The poem is said to have been written hurriedly, and it was 
evidently the product of one of those periods of spiritual 
exaltation that sometimes came to Lowell. 

"The Unhappy Lot of Mr. Knott,^^ which appeared in 1850, 
is worth notice only as the worst example of the extremes to 

which the author could go in punning. In 
owe s ater -j^-g ]^^gp poems he excelled in his appreciations 

of nature, and in short finished poems of senti- 
ment. The poems "Under the Willows^^ and "Pictures from 
Appledore'^ are representative of one class, "For an Auto- 
graph,^' "Auf Wiedersehen,'' and "Monna Lisa'' of the other. 
The "Harvard Commemoration Ode'' is his most ambitious 



The Central Period 277 

production and has called forth various judgments. Jt is 
probably safe to say that it ranks well among the occasional 
poems written in the English language during the last half of 
the nineteenth century^ but it is not one of the world^s great 
odes. It has many sonorous passages and many quotable lines 
which, after all, do not seem to get themselves quoted. The 
best known section, that on Lincoln, was not part of the origi- 
nal poem. 

^^'^The CathedraV^ reminiscent of a day spent at Chartres 
years before, is the only long poem in which Lowell treats the 
great changes in religious thought during the century in which 
he lived. It has some effective lines, but is strangely inconsistent 
in tone, and as a whole leaves an unsatisfactory impression. 
The last volume of verse. Heartsease and Rue, contains many 
sonnets to persons, and other minor poems, and some earlier 
pieces not included in former volumes. The long poem on 
the death of Agassiz, written in 1874, treats in a reminiscent 
way of the Cambridge men that Lowell knew, and has a per- 
sonal interest. ^'^FitzAdam^s Story,^^ which had originally 
been published in the ^'Atlantic Monthly'^ for 1867, is all that 
was written of a proposed series of verse tales. It is partly in 
dialect of a less pronounced order than that of the ^^Biglow 
Papers.^^ 

LowelPs prose writings consist of political and literary 

essays and a few miscellaneous papers. All the political essays 

which he cared to have preserved are contained 

^TJ' ^ -n^ in a thin volume which he compiled late in life. 

Political Essays . ^ 

With but one or two exceptions the papers m 
this collection were written during the period of Civil War 
and reconstruction, and first appeared in the ^^Atlantic'^ or the 
"North American.^^ There is no representative of the earlier 
contributions to the "Anti-Slavery Standard,^^ and other 
reform publications, and but a small part of what he wrote at 
a later time. Even the few essays that were chosen for preser- 



278 American Literature 

vation were edited and revised, some of them with a resulting 
confusion of tenses; so that they occasionally seem like 
prophecy written after the fact. This selection and revision 
was no doubt wise. During the early part of his life Lowell 
considered that his mission was poetry, and prose was but an 
unimportant avocation. In later years his most carefully 
written articles had, in order to be immediately effective, some 
of the qualities that make against permanency. The few 
selected essays give an adequate idea of his method and of his 
principles. 

Chief among these principles is a faith in democracy, based 

on faith in mankind. His confidence in the soundness of the 

American idea did not, however, blind him to 

Lowell's American faults. In his later essays, such as 

PriSes *^^* ^^ ''"^^^ ^^^^^ ^^ *^^ Independent in Poli- 

tics,^^ he shows his appreciation of American 
shortcomings with almost unpleasant frankness. His ideal- 
ism led him to argue from general truths rather than from 
expediency, even where practical questions were most immi- 
nent. His whimsicality led him to indulge in puns and di- 
gressions, even in the discussion of the most serious subjects. 
He played on the name of a Southern statesman to entitle one 
of his most earnest essays written during the War ^^The Pick- 
ens and Stealings Eebellion.^^ His candor and fairness showed 
itself now and then in some surprisingly frank statement ; and 
his moral enthusiasm is often expressed in passages of strong, 
almost impassioned, prose. 

LowelFs first volume of literary criticism was Conversations 
on some of the Old Poets, published in 1845. He chose this 
old-fashioned form in which to present his 
Cridcal^E opinions because it gave him the chance for a 

rambling treatment without apparent lack of 
unity. His later literary essays, though in more conventional 
form, are still conversations, or rather monologues, on the 



The Central Period 279 

greater writers. He rarely discussed his contemporaries, and 
— strangely in view of his sure editorial judgments — when 
he did he was not at his best. His essays on Peicival and 
Thoreau are unsound and unfair. When he professed to re- 
view a recent book he wrote an essay, after the English 
fashion, on some subject which the book suggested. He was a 
wide reader and he early acquired the habit of making marginal 
and flyleaf annotations. When he undertook an essay on Dante, 
or Chaucer, or Shakespeare, his own copies of these masters 
contained an abundance of suggestions. The disadvantage 
was that these marginal annotations, made at different times 
and in different moods, led to a rambling method of treat- 
ment, and sometimes to abrupt changes of tone. There is, 
however, usually an underlying plan to the essay, and a 
certain consistency is secured by the reappearance of a few 
favorite ideas. Among these are his faith in democracy, a 
punctiliousness regarding certain matters in the form of 
prose, an aversion to the exaltation of the Saxon element in 
the language, an insistence on the legitimacy of the Ameri- 
can idiom, a tendency to depreciate what America has done in 
literature, and a habit, more common now since the vogue of 
Matthew Arnold, of adopting the comparative method in 
discussing English literature. One of his peculiarities in 
method is that of referring to obscure and unheard of au- 
thorities in a manner that sometimes seems pedantic, and 
that is often unilluminating and wearisome. This is shown 
in an essay like ^^New England Two Centuries Ago,^^ which 
is nominally a review of two historical works. Another pe- 
culiarity is the unexpected introduction of quips, puns, and 
odd turns of phrase. Thus, in the essay on Shakespeare, he 
remarks in the midst of an otherwise serious and straight- 
forward passage: ^^Shakespeare himself has left us a preg- 
nant satire on dogmatical and categorical aesthetics (which 
commonly in discussion soon lose their ceremonious tails 



280 American Literature 

and are reduced to the internecine dog and cat of their bald 
first syllables)/^ These whimsical expressions are less notice- 
able in the later prose. With the peculiarities of the essays 
that have been mentioned goes naturally their chief virtue — 
that they are the frank, genuine expression of opinion and 
feeling by a scholar who is at the same time a whole-souled 
lovable man. It is a mistake to read the essays without 
thinking as much of the author as of the subject. 

The only volume of miscellaneous essays is the Fireside 
Travels, made up in 1864 of papers that had been published 

in magazines. The first and the best of the 
LowelPs collection is ^^Cambridge Thirty Years Ago/^ 

Ess^^s^^^^^^ in which the author recalls boyish memories 

of his native village. ^^The Moosehead Jour- 
naF^ is a rather dull account of a journey into the Northern 
woods. The greater part of the volume is made up of remi- 
niscences of Italian travels with his friend W. W. Story. These 
are somewhat thin and are full of traveller's Italian phrases 
and of references to happenings of little interest to anyone 
except the participants. Better than anything in this col- 
lection are ^'^My Garden Acquaintance^' and ^^On a Certain 
Condescension in Foreigners/' in the volume My Study Wiiv- 
dows. The first of these is an especially charming out-of- 
door essay, showing as well as any of the poems the author's 
close observation of nature. The second, on a more patriotic 
theme, contains some of his finest humor. 

During the later years of his life Lowell suffered from over- 
praise, due partly to his diplomatic and social successes 

abroad, partly to the fact that he was the most 

Lowell's available man for Harvard and literary Bos- 

ermanent ^^ ^^ ^^^ ^p ^^ ^^ .^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^j^^ -^ ^^^ 

came customary to designate him as ^^the great- 
est American man of letters." When he died he left so de- 
lightful a memory that it is still hard to determine just how 



The Central Period 381 

much this phrase means. Even in the future the critic who 
forms the acquaintance of his charming personality through 
the Letters will be tempted to rank his writings higher than 
they deserve. It seems^ however, that his poetry, the work 
by which he set the greatest store, has not the qualities that 
will give permanency. Notwithstanding its high ideals it 
is too commonplace in thought and far too imitative in form. 
Lowell never succeeded, except in his dialect verse, in develop- 
ing an individual manner. Some of the nature poems will 
long delight those who enjoy descriptive verse, the "Vision 
of Sir Launf aP^ will appeal to those who love a poetic [allegory, 
and the "Commemoration Ode^^ will hold its place among 
American patriotic poems — but the verse as a whole hardly 
makes the same popular appeal as that of Longfellow and 
Whittier, while it just lacks the perfection that would endear 
it to the scholar. 

The prose has been dismissed by one of the greatest Ameri- 
can critics with the remark that it "is of a transitory nature, 
and steadily grows less interesting.^^ This is no doubt true 
of the political writings; if it is true of the critical essays 
it is because they contain so much of the author that they 
are valuable only to those who know his personality. It 
seems likely that they will long continue to be suggestive, 
though they will no doubt lose much of their popularity as 
the traditions of Lowell the man fade away. 

It is unfortunate that whimsical lapses of taste mar the 

perfect form of all but the latest writings in 

owe s apses \^q^i^ verse and prose. In the poems the^re are 

not only prosaic lines such as have been cited 

from the "Vision of Sir Launf al,^^ but such eccentricities as : 

I waited with a maddened grin 
To hear that voice all icy thin 
Slide forth and tell my deadly sin 
To hell and heaven, Rosaline! 



382 American Literature 

in the midst of a serious impassioned lyric. In the prose 

there are puns, flippant digressions, allusions to unheard of 

men and things, and pedantic exhibitions of vocabulary, as 

in the following from Fireside Travels: 

By and by, perhaps, enough observations will have been recorded 
to assure us that these recurrences are firmamental, and histrionomers 
will have measured accurately the sidereal years of races. When that 
is once done, events will move with the quiet of an orrery and 
nations will consent to their peridynamis and apodynamis with 
planetary composure. 

Such peculiarities as these may be pardoned, or even enjoyed 
by the author^s friends, but they repel the disinterested reader 
who loves artistic work for its own sake. 

The writings of Lowell that have most chance of life are 
probably the ^^Biglow Papers.^^ These are without question 

the greatest American political satire, and 
L ^ ^ W k ^^^^ show better than anything else the 

author^s originality. It may safely be pre- 
dicted that they will live in American political history 
:as other political satires have lived; and they are fairly 
well known abroad, where it is customary to refer to 
Lowell as an American humorist. But after a generation 
such writings are little read except by the special student — 
it is their fame, and not themselves, that survives. In this case 
the dialect, now obsolete in the community where the author 
heard it spoken, may aid in hastening oblivion. 

In conclusion, it should be remembered that the promise of 
enduring literary fame is not the only praise that can be 
bestowed upon a man of letters. The greater part of LowelPs 
life and energy was given to affairs of his own time, and his 
influence on his contemporaries, if not his published works, 
gives him a place in the literary history of his country. As 
political reformer, as editor, as teacher, above all as an ex- 
ample of the type of scholarly gentleman that the new world 
was able to produce, he perhaps did more than any of his 



The Central Period 283 

contemporaries to dignify American literature at home and 
to win for it respect abroad. 

Thomas Wentworth Higginson (1823-1911), the last sur- 
vivor of the distinguished group to which he belonged, 
was a man of interesting personality and no 
Thomas small ability. He was a graduate of Harvard, 

Hkdnson ^^^ preached for a time, but gave up his pul- 

pit because of his transcendental and anti- 
slavery views. He took part in attempts to rescue fugitive 
slaves, aided in the strife to keep Kansas free, and had sym- 
pathetic knowledge of John Brown^s Virginia campaign. 
In 1862 he entered the war, and was later colonel of the 
first black regiment organized. After two years he was forced 
to leave the service on account of wounds, and for the rest of 
his life devoted himself mainly to literature and to the 
woman's suffrage movement. He published a great variety 
of works — poems, biographies, histories, and essays. As a 
controversialist he was saved from tediousness by a touch of 
humor, and his literary and miscellaneous essays are often 
charming in manner. Perhaps his most valuable work is 
found in his autobiography, which bears the apt title of 
Cheerful Yesterdays, and in some of the many late essays in 
which he gives reminiscences of the greater men he had 
known, and of the great happenings in which he had borne 
a part. 

A great host of N'ew England men and women wrote and 
spoke in favor of abolition, but few won a place in literary 
history. Mrs. Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910) 
Minor^ . was the daughter of a New York banker, but 

Writers lived in Boston after her marriage in 1843. 

Her early interests were in literary and philo- 
sophical studies, but the greater part of her long life was 
given to reforms. With her husband she edited an anti- 
Blavery paper in Boston, and after the war she became active 



384 American Literature 

in the woman's suffrage propaganda. She wrote poems, two 
plays, descriptions of travel, and other miscellaneous prose, 
and published a somewhat disappointing volume of Bemi- 
niscences. Her only work which is likely to live is the intense 
but not very intelligible "^^Battle Hymn of the Eepublic^' — 
one of many attempts by patriotic poets to fit dignified 
words to the stirring tune of ^"^John Brown^s Body/^ Lucy 
Larcom (1826-1893) belongs by association with the anti- 
slavery group, though few of the poems preserved in her col- 
lected works touch on slavery. Her girlhood was spent as an 
operative in the Lowell cotton mills. For a time she lived 
in Illinois, but returned to Massachusetts in 1852, where she 
taught school and edited ^^Our Young Folks.^^ She early 
made the acquaintance of Whittier, who often revised her 
writings. Her poems are short and mostly lyric, and many 
of the best seem like thinner echoes of Whittier's. She had 
a fondness for sentimental themes, such as the sailor^s wife 
still asking for the long lost vessel; and she wrote many 
poems for children. Her work is fairly well sustained on the 
level she adopts, and if she never approaches the heights of 
her model, Whittier, her occasional lapses are less noticeable. 

IV. Miscellaneous New England Writers 

The N'ew England writers still to be considered cannot be 
classed either as transcendentalists or as anti-slavery re- 
formers, yet most of them had some relations with one or 
both of these groups. Longfellow wrote poems on slavery, 
Hawthorne resided at Brook Farm, and Holmes was the life- 
long friend of many of the transcendentalists and wrote the 
biography of their chief. With none of these men, however, 
was political reform or idealistic philosophy the chief con- 
sideration. They represent rather the more distinctly 
scholarly and esthetic impulses of the "renaissance of New 
England.'' 



The Central Period 385 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) traced back 
his ancestry to John and Priscilla Alden and other passengers 

in the Mayflower. His father, a Harvard 
Henry graduate, was a successful lawyer in Portland, 

Longfellow where Henry was born. As a boy he showed 

characteristics that seem to foreshadow cer- 
tain limitations of his poems. He attended public school but 
one week because the boys were too rough; his favorite play- 
mates were girls; he shot off a gun but once; and he was wont 
to stuff his ears with cotton on the Fourth of July, that he 
might escape the noise. On the other hand he was a bright 
and intelligent boy, of excellent manners and disposition. 
He studied in private schools and at Bowdoin college, where 
he was graduated with the class of 1825. Among his fellow 
students at Bowdoin were Franklin Pierce, Hawthorne, and 
Abbott, the historian. 

The Longfellow home was one of culture, with a fair li- 
brary, and Henry early formed the habit of reading. His 
^'boy's one book^^ was Irving's ShetcJi-BooTc, Of the poets we 

know that he read Tom Moore, Cowper, 

Longfellow's Qssian, and on Sundays Hannah More. He 
Early Training ' -^ 

early began to write verse> and one oi his pro- 
ductions was published in a local paper when he was but 
thirteen. While in college many of his verses appeared in the 
^^United States Literary Gazette,^^ and they made up a con- 
siderable part of a volume of Miscellaneous Poems selected 
from that journal in 1826. Like hundreds of other Ameri- 
cans he felt that the time had come for the production of a 
native literature. He chose this theme for his commence- 
ment piece, and he wished to devote himself to letters as a 
profession. His father, however, advised him to study law, 
and he would probably have done so if he had not by chance 
made a favorable impression on one of the trustees of Bow- 
doin college, and so received the offer of a professorship of 



286 American Literature 

modern languages. The proffer of such a position to a 
fresh graduate seems strange now, but it must be remembered 
that Ticknor at Harvard was almost the only professor of 
modern languages in an American college, and that the salary 
of a professor at Bowdoin was only $800 or $1,000. To fit 
himself for the position Longfellow went abroad for three 
years, spending most time in France, Spain, and Italy, and a 
few months in Germany. After his return he taught French, 
Italian, and Spanish; and as textbooks were few and unsatis- 
factory he translated a French grammar, and edited read- 
ing books in French and Spanish. In 1831 he was married 
to Mary S. Potter, daughter of a neighbor at Portland. He 
began to contribute articles on literary subjects to the "North 
American Eeview,^^ and he published in the "New England 
Magazine'^ "The Schoolmaster,^^ a series of articles with an 
Addisonian introduction and notes of foreign scenes after the 
manner of the Shetch-Booh, Some of this material was used 
again in Outre-Mer, which began to appear in numbers in 
1833, and was published complete in two volumes in 1835. 
In 1833 he had also published in a thin volume a translation 
of "Coplas de Manrique.^^ 

When in 1834 Ticknor decided to resign the Smith pro- 
fessorship at Harvard, Longfellow was chosen as his successor. 
Early in the next year he went abroad, this 
^ "^ time to perfect himself in the languages of 

northern Europe. He sailed to England and spent the sum- 
mer in Sweden and Denmark. In Holland his wife died 
after a brief illness. He went to Heidelberg for the winter, 
and after a summer in Switzerland returned to take up his 
duties at Harvard. In 1839 he published Hyperion, a Ro- 
mance, and Voices of the Night, a collection of poems. Hy- 
perion is an idealized traveller's journal, the events of which 
correspond with those of the author's second visit to Europe, 
from the death of his wife to the end of his stay in Switzer- 



The Central Period 287 

land. The sub-title, ^^A Eomance'^ is deserved, if at all, be- 
cause of the introduction of a heroine, Mary Ashburton, 
whom the hero, Paul Flemming, meets in Switzerland, and 
whom he leaves after an ardent but unsuccessful wooing. 
This was a recognizable portrait of Miss Frances E. Appleton, 
whom Longfellow had met at the place described, and of 
whom he saw much in Switzerland. The more emotional 
scenes were presumably imaginary, but all the other details 
were real. This representation of a courtship on the part of 
a widower of but a few months, and the portrayal of real 
characters, seemed to many persons in bad taste, and the lady 
and her family are said to have been for a time displeased. 
Other gossip of this date pictures Longfellow as a little of a 
dandy, with what seemed to sedate Cambridge an over-fas- 
tidiousness and a love of gorgeousness in waistcoats. But 
he was successful with his classes, and he drew to himself a 
close circle of friends. Four of these. Professor Felton, 
Charles Sumner, George S. Hillard, and Henry B. Cleve- 
land, made up with Longfellow a set known as the ^^Five of 
Clubs,^^ or as they were nicknamed the ^^Mutual Admiration 
Society.^^ The larger group of his friends came to include 
Lowell, Emerson, Holmes, and indeed nearly all the Boston 
and Cambridge literary men. 

While Hyperion met with some unfriendly criticism, Voices 
of the Night was warmly received, and Longfellow again 

turned to poetry. His next work was in the 
Longfellow's ballad form, and in 1841 he published Ballads 
Poetry ^^^ other Poems, The next year he went 

abroad for his health. While confined to his 
berth during the stormy passage home he wrote his Poems on 
Slavery, These were published in a volume on his return, 3,nd 
were included in the popular edition of his works, but were 
omitted from a Philadelphia edition intended for Southern 
circulation. This omission incensed the abolitionists, as the 



388 American Literature 

poems themselves had incensed others, and for a time the 
author found himself between two fires. 

In 1843 Miss Appleton yielded to the protracted wooing of 
the poet. Her father purchased as a gift the historic Craigie 
House, in which Longfellow had taken rooms 
ongfe ow s when he first went to Cambridge, and which 
has since been associated with his name. This 
was the beginning of a period of great happiness and earnest 
productive work. The poet's domestic life was ideal, the 
circle of his friends was large and delightful, and Mrs. 
Longfellow's property together with his salary and the re- 
turns from his literary work enabled him to live in comfort. 
His works followed in rapid succession — The Belfry of Bruges 
and other Poems in 1846, Evangeline in 1847^ Kavanagh, 
a prose romance, in 1849, The Seaside and the Fireside in 
1850, The Golden Legend in 1851, Hiawatha in 1855, Miles 
Standish in 1858. Many of the shorter poems were first pub- 
lished in the magazines, particularly in the ^^Atlantic 
Monthly" after this was established in 1857. In 1854 he 
resigned his professorship that he might give himself entirely 
to literary work, and from this timxC the amount of his writ- 
ings increased. 

In 1861 the course of his life was broken by the tragic 
death of his wife. While she was sitting in the library with 
her family her dress caught fire and she was fatally burned. 
In his distress Longfellow tried to find distraction in com- 
pleting the translation of Dante, which he had begun 
years before. He also published Tales of a Wayside Inn, 
1863, and Fleur-de-Luce, a collection of shorter poems, 1866. 
The New England Tragedies, 1868, and The Divine Tragedy, 
1871, were united with The Oolden Legend, published earlier, 
to make up the trilogy Christus, a Mystery, issued in this 
form in 1872. Other late volumes were Three Boohs of Song, 
containing the second day of Tales of a Wayside Inn, 1873, 



The Central Period 289 

The Masque of Pandora, 1875, Keramos, 1878, Ultima Thule, 
1880, In the Harbor, 1882. In 1868-9 Longfellow was again 
abroad, and during his visit to England received the degrees 
of LL.D. from Cambridge and D.C.L from Oxford. During 
his later years he lived at Craigie House, surrounded by his 
children and friends, receiving modestly but complacently 
the tributes of admiration from many readers. The long 
dramatic poem ^^Michael Angelo,^^ which he had had by him 
for many years, but never fully completed, was published the 
year after his death. 

Longfellow^s character was one of great mildness, sweet- 
ness, and purity rather than of strength. He made himself 

widely beloved; and he took his chief enjoy- 
Ch^ t^^^ ment in the home circle, the library, and the 

quieter pleasures of life. He was strangely 
indifferent to the forces that were acting about him. He was 
a friend of Emerson and other transcendentalists, yet one 
might read all his writings and never suspect that a great 
ethical and philosophical upheaval was going on about him. 
He lived through the anti-slavery struggle, and always pro- 
fessed in a quiet way his opposition to slavery; yet his few 
poems on the subject were written as a diversion on a rough 
ocean voyage as early as 1842. In the more stirring years 
that followed his interest seems to have come largely second- 
hand through his friendship for Charles Sumner. Still more 
strange was his apparent indifference to art. At the time of 
his early journeys abroad all New England was experiencing 
an artistic awakening, but in poems, essays, and published 
letters he scarcely makes mention of a picture or a statue, 
and he refers to a building, if at all, only for its connection 
with some legend. In Florence he notices only some wax- 
works representing scenes of the plague, and these he ranks 
as ^^equally admirable^^ with Dante's poem. Even in ^^Michael 
Angelo,'' written late in life, he touches on art but lightly, 



290 AliiERiCAN Literature 

and then only to echo commonplace criticism. His nearest 
approach to an adequate treatment of an artistic theme is 
perhaps found in the bookish dilettantism of ^^Keramos/^ 

In minute scholarship Longfellow was inferior to Ticknor, 
his predecessor, and Lowell, his successor, in the Smith pro- 
fessorship. The weakness of his classics, 
s h 1 h^^ especially, gave critics a chance to make an 
absurd ado over such matters as the use of the 
adjective for the adverbial form in ^^Excelsior,^^ and the mis- 
quotation in the opening lines of ^^Jugurtha/^ His favorite 
reading was in the poets of the middle ages and Southern 
Europe, and he took especial pleasure in those legends which 
teach a truth of universal application. He left no essays of 
value to the careful student, but he did much to acquaint 
America with the songs, sayings, and traditions of Conti- 
nental Europe. 

Tip to the time of his graduation from college Longfellow 

had sought expression in verse rather than prose. The early 

T ^ 11 » poems show smoothness of versification and 

Longfellow's . .. -4. j? • ;i ^ • x.- x. 

I>rose Outre- simplicity oi expression, and contain hints, 

Mer and though no obvious imitations, of Wordsworth, 

Hyperion Moore, Bryant, and others. On his selection 

for the Bowdoin professorship he relinquished the idea of 
writing poetry, and for ten or twelve years his chief literary 
activity was in prose. Outre-Mer, written under the influence 
of Southern Europe, and after the model of Irving's Sketch- 
Booh, is a thin copy of a popular original. The style, at least 
in the opening parts, has a slight affectation of quaintness, the 
descriptions tend to run to adjectives, and the humor is but 
partly successful. The book illustrates the author's fondness 
for old legends, his tendency to observe persons rather than 
things, and his quiet moralizing. Hyperion, written after 
his second trip abroad, shows the influence of German senti- 
mentalism. It is a less healthy book than Outre-Mer, and 



The Central Period 291 

it represents a passing mood of the author^s mind rather 
than his real self. The style is too affected^ and there is too 
much of a disposition to discuss the great problems of life 
on the part of a young man whose experience was on the 
whole very limited. At no other period, probably, would 
Longfellow have written in just this way of ^'^Dante, Cer- 
vantes, Byron, and others ; men of iron — men who have dared 
to breast the strong breath of public opinion,^^ and more of 
the same sort. 

The only later prose work aside from unimportant maga- 
zine articles was Kavanagh, written ten years after Hyperion. 
This romance was suggested by the author's 
observations of life at Pittsfield, Massachu- 
setts, where he spent a summer. In the village school- 
master, whose duties keep him from the great literary work 
that he wishes to undertake, Longfellow evidently saw him- 
self. The hero, Kavanagh, is a wonderful young clergyman, 
who quotes Maria del Occidente, and is adored by the two 
most charming young women of his congregation. In the 
end he marries one of these heroines, and the other dies of a 
broken heart. The book contains much admirable material 
in the shape of incidents of village life, but they are 
introduced as if from a notebook, without the vivifying 
touch that would make them effective. The story is 
not well knit together and leaves but an unsatisfactory 
impression. 

All of Longfellow's prose work received considerable praise, 
and Hyperion was especially popular with sentimental people, 
some of whom it is said took it for their guide book for the 
Ehine, and in Switzerland traced out the exact course fol- 
lowed by the hero. Kavanagh has been commended by such 
diverse critics as Hawthorne and Howells. Yet it is doubt- 
ful if the names of these works would be remembered to-day 
if it were not for the author's fame as a poet. 



293 American Literature 

This poetic fame may be said to have begun with the pub- 
lication of Voices of the Night in 1839. Up to this time 

Longfellow^s claims as a poet rested on some 
jjj , ^ creditable juvenile pieces in the magazines 

and the verse translation of ^^Coplas de Man- 
rique/' It was in 1838-9, while in the mood that resulted in 
Hyperion, that he wrote some moralizing pieces that he called 
^Tsalms/^ — a term which he retained in the title of but one 
of them, the ^Tsalm of Life/^ These are in a variety of 
simple lyric measures, and show, in both thought and form, 
some influence of the German. Each presents simple reflec- 
tions on some of the great problems of life, and closes, as was 
the author^s wont, with a definite exhortation or moral les- 
son. It was these "^^psalms^^ that really gave popularity to 
the Voices of the Night, and that have been retained under 
the title of this volume in later editions. They are typical 
of a large group of the author's poems — the simple rhymed 
expression of simple, genuine aspiration and feeling. This 
form of poetry, whatever critical judgment may be passed 
upon it, is one which makes a wide appeal. Of the eight 
poems which, with the ^Trelude,'' are grouped as "Voices of 
the Nighf ' in late editions, all may be said to be familiar, 
and at least one-half are among the best known poems in the 
language. 

In his next volume Longfellow turned to the ballad. In 
adopting this form he was probably influenced by the German 

and Norse ballads, some of which he trans- 
LongfeUow's ^^^^^^ j.^^ ^^^^g^. ^^^ ^^^^ ^j^^ j^^ followed 
BaUads 

the advice which he had earlier given to Ameri- 
can authors, and chose distinctively American subjects. Yet 
"The Skeleton in Armor'' and "The Wreck of the Hesperus'' 
are in form imitations of the antique. The test of a ballad 
should perhaps be its popularity; and judged by this test 
"Tlie Wreck of the Hesperus" must be pronounced successful. 



The Central Period 393 

Yet it is untrue to life and contains an obtrusive moral that 

the true folk-ballad would have avoided. 

The poems on slavery^ written the next year, were another 

attempt to treat an American theme. They are simple and 

pretty, but the inevitable comparison with 

The Spanish Whittier's utterances on the same subject 
Student t i , « r> 

brings out their bookishness and lack of force. 

^^The Spanish Student/^ the first of several dramatic 
compositions, had really preceded the two last-mentioned 
volumes in date of writing, but was not published in book 
form until 1843. The story was an old one, told by Cer- 
vantes, and used by various Spanish dramatists and by 
Middleton. It fits well with the romantic mood in which the 
author found himself about the time of its composition, and 
gives the opportunity for some good verse, including Long- 
fellow's best song for music, ^*^Stars of the Summer Night/^ 
The action, however, does not carry the reader along with it. 
The characters are bookish, not real. Even the speeches of 
the servant, Chispa, with their apt application of Spanish 
proverbs, seem artificial, and give the impression of excellent 
material unskilfully used. 

In the volumes of 1845 and 1846 Longfellow continued the 
forms of composition which he had tried before, but in 
^^Evangeline^' he attempted a long narrative 
poem. The well-known story that Hawthorne 
declined to use the plot, while Longfellow eagerly welcomed 
it, shows, if true, how well each knew his own capabilities. 
The mildly sentimental story, with its slight action and its 
pathos, was admirably suited to the poet's genius, and many 
of his critics consider the poem his masterpiece. In view of 
the fact that the descriptions have a great charm for many 
readers it is interesting to note that they were based on such 
works as the author found in his library, and on a travelling 
diorama of the Mississippi, the coming of which he records 



394 American Literature 

in his diary as a ^^special benediction/' He had never 
seen and he made no attempt to see the places which he por- 
trays. The poem precipitated a discussion on the possibilities 
of English hexameters^ and is still one of the best known 
illustrations of what may be accomplished in this metre. 

The poet again turned to the middle age in the ^^Golden 
Legend/' which will be mentioned later as part of the trilogy 
of "Christus.'' In "Hiawatha'' he took up 
another American theme. Many authors had 
made use of Indian subjects^ and each had been blamed either 
for over-idealizing his characters^ or for making them so 
realistic as to be repulsive. Longfellow decided to write, not 
of individual Indians, but of the myths and traditions of the 
race. His material was mostly taken from Schoolcraft, who 
had just published the result of his researches among the 
Indians of the ISTorthwest. The legends are of course selected 
and modified for poetic purposes. The metre, the unrhymed 
trochaic tetrameter, is that of the Finnish epic, the "Kale- 
vala," and was chosen as being in keeping with the nature 
of the subject and the character of the Indians themselves. 
The metre is perhaps the most marked characteristic of the 
poem. Its movement took the ear, though it was often criti- 
cised as jigging and monotonous. The lack of rhyme made 
easy a host of parodies that complicated the discussion. 
The popular judgment was strongly in favor of both the 
content and the form of the poem, and it is still known to 
every one. Of late, however, it seems to make its strongest 
appeal to children. 

The choice of these unusual metres for "Evangeline" and 
"Hiawatha" indicates how carefully Longfellow studied metri- 
cal effects, and how readily he adopted meas- 
M^^^l^Eff^ t ^^^^ from foreign sources. His ear was not 
so sensitive as that of some poets, and he 
sometimes carried the use of a device too far, as often in 



The Central Period 295 

"^^Hiawatha/^ and in the sibilant line often quoted from 

^^Evangeline/^ 

When she had passed it seemed like the ceasing of exquisite music. 

On the other hand his taste never failed him altogether; and 

often his verses have a haunting quality that defies analysis, 

as in "My Lost Youth •/' 

I can see the shadowy lines of trees, 

And catch, in sudden gleams, 
The sheen of the far-surrounding seas, 
And islands that were the Hesperides 
Of all my boyish dreams. 

And the burden of that old song. 
It murmurs and whispers still : 
"A boy*s will is the wind's will, 
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." 

"The Courtship of Miles Standish^^ suggests "Evangeline'^ 
in both form and method, though it is less sentimental and 

probably stronger. Priscilla's answer, about 
p ®^ arrative ^j^j^,]^ fj^^ story centers, was a tradition in the 

poef s family. The "Tales of a Wayside Inn'' 
are a series of stories put in the mouths of various persons 
supposed to gather at the old inn at Sudbury, a favorite 
resort of college parties from Cambridge. The characters, 
whose identity is but thinly veiled, were friends of the author, 
the best-known being Ole Bull, the violinist, and Thomas 
William Parsons, the poet. The fact that the speakers repre- 
sent many nationalities made it easy to introduce a great 
variety of stories which the author had met in his reading. 
But one of the tales is said to be of his own invention. 

Christus, made up of the "Divine Tragedy,'' "The Golden 
Legend," and "The New England Tragedies," was a work 

by which the author set great store, but which 

never became popular. It is a trilogy in 
which Part I represents the ancient world. Part II the mid- 
dle age, and Part III the present. "The Divine Tragedy^' 



296 American Literature 

is little more than a paraphrase into verse of the gospel ac- 
count of Christ's life, the three acts or ^^passovers'^ each repre- 
senting a year of his ministry. It seems strange that Long- 
fellow, with his fondness for simple expression, should not 
have seen how far inferior his version was to the prose of the 
Scripture narrative. ^^The Golden Legend/' the earliest and 
the most popular of the divisions of the poem, retells a story 
of superstition and maidenly devotion. The main events and 
the illustrative material are not well interwoven, and the 
reader feels as he often does in Longfellow's complex nar- 
ratives, that material has been introduced from a notebook. 
The "New England Tragedies" are two, "John Endicott" 
and "Giles Corey." Both deal with Puritan intolerance and 
superstition, shown in the former in the persecution of the 
Quakers, and in the latter in the delusion of the Salem 
witchcraft. The pictures are worked up with considerable 
antiquarian detail, but the plots are not well organized. This 
is especially true of "John Endicott," where both the hero 
and the heroine are lost sight of at the end, and the chief 
interest in the plot is not resolved. In the trilogy as a whole 
the difference between the parts is so great that there is no 
sense of unity, and the representation of the present by 
Puritan intolerance hardly seems adequate. 

The later poems of Longfellow are similar in kind and 
quality to those which had gone before. They include more 

"Tales of a Wayside Inn," the dramatic poems 
La?ef pl'Lms ''^^^ Masque of Pandora" and "Judas Mac- 

cabseus," and short poems, many of them of 
a personal nature. Among the best known of these is "The 
Hanging of the Crane," suggested by the home-making of 
the poet's friend, Thomas Bailey Aldrich. "Michael Angelo" 
is in dramatic form. It represents scenes in the life of the 
great artist and teaches the virtue of labor and single-minded 
devotion to art. 



The Central Period 297 

Short translations, chiefly lyrics and ballads, from most of 
the European languages, were produced throughout the poet's 
life. Those which were suited to his genius 
tSSs ^^^^^ ^^*^ faithfully and sympathetically ren- 
dered. His most ambitious translation, that 
of Dante, is praised for its "elegant literalness,^^ but the 
strength and power of the original were not his to give. 

All of Longfellow's works are readable, but in searching 
for those on which his fame rests it is as well to discard the 
prose, the dramas and dramatic poems, the 
Ek asToet translation of Dante, and most of the "Tales 
of a Wayside Inn.'' There remain "Hia- 
watha,^' "Evangeline," and "Miles Standish,'^ a few ballads 
and other verse narratives, and a large number of poems of 
human aspiration and feeling. All these live with undimin- 
ished vigor, but it is those of the last group that are best 
known and that constitute the poet's best claim to remem- 
brance. If judgment is based on the number of poems that 
are household quotations there is no question that in America 
and probably in England Longfellow exceeds every modern 
poet in popularity. His admirers also point out that the 
works of no other English-speaking poet of his century have 
been so widely translated. It is much to be the favorite poet 
of so many people. But the extravagant praise which has 
followed this popularity has sometimes seemed to lay on the 
critic the necessity of calling attention to the author's limi- 
tations. These are mostly due to the character of the man, 
and many of them have been indicated in the preceding dis- 
cussion. He lacked strength, originality, the seeing eye. 
He wrote from books rather than from first hand observa- 
tion, and he failed to appreciate the great movements that 
were stirring the nation, and all deeply thinking men. On 
the other hand, the purity of his life, his patriotism, and the 
tenderness with which he sympathized with the more com- 



298 American Literature 

mon trials of men and women are as fully reflected in his 
verse as are his defects. He never wrote an impure line, or 
one that would lessen the reverence of man for truth. And 
to the youngs and to thousands of readers whose lives have 
fallen in quiet places, his ^Tsalms'^ bring exactly the solace 
and inspiration that they need. It is to be regretted that some 
of these poems sin against perfect art. The ^Tsalm of Life^' 
would be a richer possession if its lesson had been presented 
effectively in less sing-song verse, and without the absurd 
mixture of metaphor so often pointed out : 

And departing leave behind us, 
Footprints on the sands of time; 

Footprints, that perhaps another, 

Sailing o'er lifers solemn main, 
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, 

Seeing f shall take heart again. 

Still, most of the faults in the poems are not glaring. 

Few true-minded persons fail to find in Longfellow's poems 
something that appeals strongly to them in childhood and 
early youth ; and fortunate are they to whom the same simple 
consolation and exhortation remains adequate throughout 
life. The man who feels the full stress of modern thought 
may be tempted to exclaim: 

And common is the commonplace 
And vacant chaff well meant for grain, 

but he is an intellectual snob if he fails to honor the poetry 

that he found an inspiration in his simpler days. 

Nathaniel Hathorne (1804-1864), or, as he wrote it later, 

Hawthorne, was born in Salem. His earliest American an- 
cestor, who came to Salem in 1637, was a 

Hawth ^^^ ^^ weight in the community, and his son 

was one of the witch judges. The family 

declined in social importance, however, and for two genera- 



The Central Period 299 

tions before the birth of Nathaniel the Hathornes had been 
sea captains. The story of loss of title to an estate in Maine, 
and certain traditions regarding family temper and peculiari- 
ties, are pretty faithfully repeated in The House of the Seven 
Gables, Nathaniel^s father died in 1808, and his mother, 
though apparently not a morbid woman, withdrew entirely 
from the world, living in her own room, and never sitting at 
table even with her children. This peculiar home life doubt- 
less had its effect on her son. In 1818 she removed for a time 
to Maine, where she had relatives, and here Nathaniel 
rambled in the woods and, as he says, acquired his habit of 
solitude. Although the family were left with little means 
an uncle undertook the charge of his education, and he suf- 
fered no great hardships. He went back to Salem to pre- 
pare for college and in 1821 entered Bowdoin. 

There seems to have been nothing unusual about Haw- 
thorne^s boyhood and college days. He had few intimates, 
but he was not a recluse, and he had his share 
Youth ^^^^ ^ ^^ boyish escapades and college scrapes. His 
feat of printing a weekly ^^Spectator^^ with 
his pen at the age of sixteen, and some juvenile rhymes are 
hardly significant of anything more than an interest in 
books. His pride at the same age in learning to chew tobacco, 
and later in some college dissipations shows nothing but boy- 
ishness. His scholarship was fair. Among his fellow stu- 
dents at Bowdoin were Longfellow, Franklin Pierce, and 
Horatio Bridge, the last two throughout life his closest 
friends. It was during his last year at college that he adopted 
the ^V^^ in his name. 

After his graduation Hawthorne went back to Salem, where 
he lived twelve or fourteen years in a secluded way, entering 
no profession, and seeing little of the world. It is possible 
that he had begun Fanshawe while at college. If not, his 
earliest literary attempt was ^^Seven Tales of my Native 



300 American Literature 

Land/' a collection of short stories which he burned after 
trying in vain to find a publisher. In 1828 he published at 
^ his own expense Fanshawe, a rather melo- 

Early Writings dramatic romance of college life. This at- 
tracted little attention, and he soon regretted 
its publication and made every effort to suppress it. After 
his death his family characteristically included it in his col- 
lected works. He next wrote ^Trovincial Tales/' for which as 
a collection he could find no publisher, but some of which 
Goodrich took for use in his annual, the ^^Token.'' Among 
these were ^The Gentle Boy/' and some of the other better 
known ^^Twice-Told Tales." From this time he continued to 
write tales and short sketches, publishing in the ^^Token'' 
and in magazines. In 1836, after he had been eleven years 
out of college without any regular remunerative employment, 
he undertook the editorship of the ^^ American Magazine of 
Useful and Entertaining Knowledge" at a salary of $500. 
This was mere hackwork, and he did not regret that the 
venture soon failed. The next year he compiled for Goodrich 
a Peter Parley book. Universal History on the Basis of 
Geography. All this time he had published nothing over his 
own signature, and his name was first made known to the 
public through an enthusiastic notice by his friend Park 
Benjamin, published in a New York magazine in 1835. 
About this time Horatio Bridge, without Hawthorne's 
knowledge, gave a financial guarantee that insured the pub- 
lication in 1837 of a volume of short sketches. The fact 
that these had been published before, most of them in the 
''Token/' led to the adoption of the title Twice Told Tales, 
The appearance of this, his first work under his own name, 
tended to bring the author out of his seclusion. A stronger 
influence in the same direction was exerted by the Peabodys, 
an old Salem family, who began a systematic attempt to 
form the acquaintance of their recluse neighbor. The ulti- 



The Central Period 301 

mate result was the engagement of IsTathaniel Hawthorne to 
the younger daughter^ Sophie Peabody. 

The responsibility of an engagement impressed on Haw- 
thorne the need of doing something for a living, and through 

the influence of friends he secured an appoint- 
aw ornem jj^ej^t as weigher and ganger in the Boston 

custom house. His duties were to watch the 
unloading of vessels and to keep tally of the cargo. At first 
he enjoyed the novelty of the occupation, but he soon sickened 
of it, as he always did of any systematic work. The Peabody 
family had removed to Boston, where they engaged in pub- 
lishing and bookselling. It was probably at the solicitation 
of the older sister, Elizabeth Peabody, that he wrote three 
volum-es of child^s stories. Grandfather s Chair, Famous Old 
People, and Liberty Tree, These represent his only important 
literary work during his residence in Boston. In 1841, with 
the change of administration, he lost his position, and at once 
joined the Brook Farm community. 

The Brook Farm scheme seems impractical in retrospect, 
yet it was carefully planned by men of business sense, and 

was really more promising than many of the 
Hawthorne at ^^promoted^^ enterprises in which literary and 

professional men are every year induced to 
invest their money. Hawthorne was not enthusiastic over 
transcendentalism, though Miss Peabody and her family were, 
and he seems to have joined the community because he 
thought it the best way to provide for a home. The original 
plan looked to the building on the farm of cottages for mar- 
ried couples and he hoped soon to occupy one of these. He 
invested his entire savings, $1,000, in stock, and took up his 
residence as a working member of the community. At first 
he had some slight enthusiasms, but they soon passed away, 
and he recorded in his journal the conclusion that ^^Labor 
is the curse of the world, and nobody can meddle with it 



303 American Literature 

without being proportionably brutified/^ By the middle 
of the first summer he was sick of the whole affair, but after 
an absence of some weeks he returned as a boarder. He com- 
plained that the conditions were not favorable to literary 
work, and he produced only one short story, and another 
child^s book, Biographical Stories for Children. 

In the spring of 1842 Hawthorne left Brook Farm for 
good, and though his savings were tied up in the company, 

and he had no regular occupation, he was 
the Old^M^ married in July, and took up his residence in 

the Old Manse at Concord. Glimpses of his life 
here show an idyllic sort of existence, with the most romantic 
devotion on the part of the married lovers, and delightful 
excursions by wood and stream with Thoreau and Ellery 
Channing. The care of providing for a family weighed on 
him, and he was troubled by lack of means — just how seri- 
ously is uncertain. Through the influence of friends he at 
last secured the position of surveyor of customs at Salem. 
During his four years' residence in Concord he had written 
a considerable number of tales, and these he collected in 
1846 as Mosses from an Old Manse. In the same year he 

assumed his duties in the Salem custom house, 
CusU)m Ho?se ^^^ continued until he was removed after the 

change of administration in 1849. His salary 
was only $1,200, but his official duties occupied only three or 
four hours daily. As usual, he found them uncongenial 
after the novelty was gone. Notwithstanding what seems 
abundant time he wrote very little. 

Hawthorne was a non-resident when he was given one of 
the most important offices in the little city of Salem. His 
appointment came through influences not local, and though 
he was faithful and business-like he stood aloof from his 
fellow townsmen, and especially from those with commercial 
interests. It was natural that when a change of administra- 



The Central Period 303 

tion came no one should protest strongly if he fell a victim 
to the spoils system. He had felt^ however, that his appoint- 
ment was a sort of literary pension, and was not only indig- 
nant but apparently surprised that anyone should think of 
displacing him. His indignation was directed against the 
entire community of Salem, but especially against some of 
his associates, whom he lampooned in the introduction to 
The Scarlet Letter, and a Mr. TJpham, whom he tried to hold 
up to scorn in The House of the Seven Gables, 

In his first despondency after leaving the custom house 
he wrote his friend Hillard asking for the suggestion of 

^^some stated literary employment, in con- 
Hawthorne nection with a newspaper, or as corrector 
Writes The a ^ ^ 
Scarlet Letter ^^ ^^^ press to some printing establishment.^' 

So far as is known this was the only time 
except during his brief editorship of the ^^Magazine of Use- 
ful and Entertaining Knowledge^' that he ever signified a 
willingness to accept any systematic literary employment, 
or indeed any employment not political. This request was 
not pushed, and he began work on The Scarlet Letter, while 
the family lived on a small sum that Mrs. Hawthorne had 
saved from her household allowance, and on a contribution 
from Hillard and other friends. The time was unfavorable 
for literary production, for besides worrying over financial 
affairs he was distracted by his mother's illness and death, 
and by illness in his own family. According to the well- 
known story The Scarlet Letter was planned as the leading 
tale in a collection of short stories, and was expanded at the 
suggestion of James T. Fields, the publisher. It appeared in 
April, 1850, and had remarkable success. Its author was at 
last famous. 

Although Hawthorne had expressed his contempt for 
Salem and its people he continued to reside there until after 
the publication oi The Scarlet Letter. The ill-natured per- 



304 American Literature 

sonal comments on his associates in the custom house, which 
were introduced in the sketch prefixed to this romance, 
aroused an indignation that must have made 
Hawthorne's life in the city unpleasant ; and it was with lit- 
Residences ^^^ regret on either side that he left his native 

town and took up his residence in the Berk- 
shire hills. Here, with the Sedgwicks and Herman Melville 
for neighbors, he lived for a year and a half. During the 
fall and early winter of 1850 he wrote his second romance, 
The House of the Seven Gables. Part of the next year he 
gave to The Wonder Booh, which, like the Tanglewood Tales, 
published two years later, was a retelling of classic myths 
for children. Later in 1851 he compiled The Snow Image 
and Other Twice Told Tales, a series of sketches that had 
appeared in periodicals, but had not been republished. In the 
same year the family removed to West Newton, and after- 
ward to Concord, where Hawthorne had bought Alcott's 
house, the Wayside. West Newton was near the site of 
Brook Farm, though this may have had nothing to do with 
the fact that he made the famous community the background 
for his next long tale. The Blithedale Romance, published in 
1852. Shortly after his removal to the Wayside he was asked 
to write a campaign life of his old friend, Franklin Pierce, 
now a candidate for the presidency. This work had no 
literary importance, and is of interest mainly because of the 
views which it expresses on slavery and kindred matters. 
After his election Pierce reciprocated the favor by appointing 
Hawthorne TJnited States consul at Liverpool. 

For four years Hawthorne was an efficient consul, but as 
before he fretted under his official duties. He travelled 
somewhat about England, but he never really came to enjoy 
the country, or to have more than a half affection for its 
people. He did not meet the greater literary men, and he 
never entered, except in a formal way, into any of the 



The Central Period 305 

life about him. Only the salary reconciled him to his 

position. This, though reduced by congress during his 

term, enabled him to repay the gift which 

Hawthorne friends had made through Hillard, and to 

Liverpool ^^^ ^^^^^ ^ ^^^ *^^* relieved him from 

fear of later want. 
After resigning the consulate in 1857 he spent a year and 

a half in Italy, living for a time in Eome and 
Hawthorne in -^ Florence. In the latter he occupied the 

old villa Just outside the city which furnished 
the suggestion of Monte Beni in The Marble Faun. In the 
spring of 1859 he returned to England and took up his resi- 
dence on the Yorkshire coast. He had begun another 
romance at Florence, and he finished it at Eedcar. The 
next year it was published in England as The Transforma- 
tion, and in America as The Marble Faun. In 1860 Haw- 
thorne returned to Concord. 

The reader of Hawthorne^s notebooks kept during his 
foreign residence is impressed with the fact that he went 

abroad too late in life to derive the greatest 
Effect of enjoyment from his travels. Until he reached 

Travds^^^^'^ middle age he had scarcely been outside New 

England, and he found it hard to adapt him- 
self to new methods of life, not to mention new habits of 
thought. The petty annoyances of travel irritated him, and 
while he was never an habitual grumbler, he sometimes found 
it hard to be a sympathetic visitor. Italy pleased him, on 
the whole, more than England, yet the remark on sour bread, 
forced so absurdly into The Marble Faun, is only one of 
many indications that show how he dwelt on unpleasant 
trifles. Among the most interesting passages in the foreign 
notebooks are those that trace the development of his taste in 
art. While in England he began to visit galleries, and to 
analyze his appreciation and lack of appreciation, and he 



30fi American Literature 

continued the process under more favorable conditions in 
Italy. His usual attitude is that of the man who feels that 
he ought to enjoy art, but who is really bored by it. Occa- 
sionally he grew enthusiastic. His appreciations were, how- 
ever, erratic, and he never became quite at ease regarding 
such conventionalities as the nude in sculpture. 

When Hawthorne returned to Concord in 1860 his career 
as an author was almost finished. His health was failing 

and he was troubled by the state of political 
Hawthorne s affairs. He had never taken an active interest 

in politics, but he had been nominally a 
democrat, and he retained his old political faith, such as it 
was, with little change. He never came to sympathize with 
the anti-slavery agitation, and he wrote, ^^I rejoice that the 
old Union is smashed.^^ Though he spoke of himself as a 
war democrat and a ISTorthern man he could not but realize 
that he was out of sympathy with his natural associates. He 
published nothing concerning contemporary events except 
an article "Chiefly about War Matters,^^ in the "Atlantic^^ for 
1862. The next year he contributed to the same periodical 
Our Old Home, a series of papers compiled from the note- 
books that he had kept in England. He was trying to pro- 
duce another stor)^, and he completed an instalment or two 
of The Dolliver Romance for the "Atlantic,^' but his power 
of sustained work was gone, and he died in May, 1864. 

Available information regarding Hawthorne the man is 
less than might be desired. The chief facts of his life, as 

already given, are unquestioned, but it is hard 

?p"^^l^^''^^® to feel that one really knows his character. 
of Hawthorne ^ -,. ., ,. . -, i -, i . 

He was ordinarily retiring and revealed him- 
self but little outside his family circle. He expressed the 
wish that no authorized biography be published, and the 
family refused to allow Lowell, or other competent biogra- 
phers, access to the materials in their possession. Their 



The Central Period 307 

scruples did not prevent the son from writing Nathaniel 

Hawthorne and his Wife, a Biography, or the daughter and 

her husband from publishing various works on the father. 

All these books are gossipy, but exceedingly unsatisfactory. 

The reader is left with the uncomfortable feeling that he may 

be doing injustice to a man because of insufficient data. 

Though in some ways representative of Xew England, 

Hawthorne seems to have lacked the energy and the sense of 

independence so common in his neighbors. 

Hawthorne's His family was not well-to-do, and he owed 

Personal ^ j^lg education to the bounty of a relative, yet 

l^eiiciexicies ^ >j 

he was content to settle down at home after 

leaving college, and made no serious attempt to earn his own 
living. Indeed, though he faithfully performed tasks that he 
undertook, he seems to have had an aversion to systematic 
labor of all sorts. Having devoted himself to literature, he 
apparently felt that the nation owed him a living. His atti- 
tude toward Groodrich, who really did much for him, was 
ungrateful and somewhat patronizing. He was indignant 
at his fellow-townsmen because they did not appreciate him, 
and at the government because it did not continue him in 
office. After he was removed from the Salem custom house 
he accepted a gift of money made up by subscription among 
his friends. It is true that he paid this back at a later time, 
and even if he had not done so there was nothing at all discred- 
itable in his receiving such a token of esteem; but not every 
able-bodied and able-minded Yankee would have taken it 
without making stronger efforts in his own behalf. 

These apparent weaknesses, if they are such, are over- 
shadowed by characteristics of which we are convinced by 
indications rather than by direct evidence. The devotion 
which his friends Pierce and Bridge felt for him could have 
been inspired only by a man who had something noble in 
his nature. The faithfulness with which he always per- 



308 American Literature 

formed unpleasant duties is greatly to his credit. So is his 
manliness in refusing to withdraw the dedicatory address to 
his friend Pierce when the publishers protested 
Hawthorne's that association with the name of that dis- 
OualYw^ credited statesman would ruin the sale of 

Our Old Home. In his family life he ap- 
pears, even after allowance is made for some over-drawn 
idyllic pictures, as a man of wonderful sympathy and sweet- 
ness. It is the fact that some of these traits are not readily 
reconciled with others mentioned before that makes the man 
in his relation to his writings hard to comprehend. 

After Hawthorne's death his family published several 
volumes of selections from his notebooks, and some unfin- 
ished romances. The notebooks were a com- 
NTb^k^^^ bination of commonplace book and journal, 
in which he jotted down hints for stories, and 
thought and facts that might be useful, together with detailed 
accounts of excursions and interesting experiences. They 
were intended for his eye alone and the propriety of pub- 
lishing them might be questioned. Still, if available as he 
wrote them, they would be of value to the close student of 
his literary art. Unfortunately they are so edited as to be 
almost worthless. In Passages from the American Note-Boohs 
omissions are not indicated, and quotations from letters are 
introduced without being clearly designated as such. In the 
English Note-Books passages used in the preparation of Our 
Old Home, and in the Italian Note-Boohs some of those 
used in The Marble Faun are omitted, so that there is little 
opportunity to study the author's method of re-working ma- 
terial. 

A similar criticism may be passed on the editing of the 
unfinished romances. There are four of these, representing 
as many attempts to develop ideas long in the author's mind. 
One of these, published as ''The Ancestral Foot- Step," is a 



The Central Period 309 

series of studies written in 1858. The story is connected 

with the tradition of a bloody footprint at the entrance of 

SmithelFs Hall^ England^ and involves the 

Hawthorne's relation between the fortunes of an English 
Unfinished t t j. • xi - £ 

Romances house and a secret m the possession oi an 

American emigrant. ^^Doctor Grimshaw's 
Secret'^ is another and probably a later attempt to use the 
same material, with the addition of a reference to the elixir of 
life. ^^Septimius Felton" makes use of the same theme. All 
these had been abandoned by the author, and he had de- 
termined that the final form should be that of the ^^Dolliver 
Eomance.^^ In this the idea of a bloody footprint and the 
international element do not occur. These fragmentary and 
rejected manuscripts, if printed exactly as Hawthorne wrote 
them, would be of interest in showing how he built up a 
romance. But they have, according to the editor's notes, been 
changed in minor but unindicated respects, evidently with 
the idea of improving the continuity and making them more 
readable. On the whole, the posthumous volumes as issued 
are chiefly a vexation to the student of Hawthorne, and serve 
little useful purpose except to swell the copyright receipts of 
his heirs. 

The unfinished romances do, however, illustrate the per- 
sistency with which he clung to an idea which impressed him 
as having literary possibilities. Long before he knew the legend 
of SmithelFs Hall he had entered in the notebooks a reference 
to a man whose foot left everywhere a bloody print. The 
thought of earthly immortality had long fascinated him, as is 
shown by references in the notebooks, and by the use of a simi- 
lar idea in ^^Doctor Heidegger's Experiment.'' The plan of 
writing an Anglo-American romance occurred to him when 
he first thought of going abroad, and he relinquished it only 
after repeated trials. These unfinished narratives also show 
how the habit of using vague symbolism grew with years. 



310 American Literature 

They contain some passages quite as powerful in their sug- 
gestiveness as anything that he ever wrote. 

Hawthorne^s important literary work divided itself into 
two groups, the short stories and sketches and the romances. 

The most valuable of the former are included 
Hawthorne's in three volumes, the Twice-Told Tales, the 
Sketches Mosses from an Old Manse, and The Snow 

Image and other Twice-Told Tales. Some 
of them are stories with action and plot, some are mere 
sketches owing their interest to the charm with which the 
author invests the commonplace. The stories show consider- 
able variety, but the best of them are studies of human beings 
placed in some peculiar situation with reference to their fel- 
low men, or to moral problems. Thus, ^The Minister's Black 
VeiF' shows a man who separates himself from others by 
wearing a symbol of the isolation of every human soul; 
^^Dr. Heidegger's Experiment'' is a study of the actions of 
three old persons who are able, temporarily^ to regain youth. 
^^Eappaccini's Daughter" develops the conception of a woman 
so nurtured that her touch, or even her breath, is poison to 
others of her race. Though the situations which interested 
him involved moral problems, he rarely, as in ^^A Eill from 
the Town-Pump," wrote with the apparent purpose of teach- 
ing a lesson. In ^^The Gentle Boy," and a few other early 
stories, he approached very near the sentimentality whicli 
has been seen in some of his contemporaries. He was fond 
of old New England backgrounds, as in ^^The Gentle Boy," 
^'The Gray Champion," ''Endicott and the Eed Cross," and 
the four "Legends of the Province House." One of the most 
individual characteristics of his method is his suggestive- 
ness. This is reasonably definite in "The Great Carbuncle," 
"The Minister's Black Veil," "The Snow Image." In other 
and on the whole better tales it is indefinite — a faint smbol- 
ism, too evanescent to be analyzed, or illustrated by quota- 



The Central Period 311 

tions apart from the context^ but plainly felt. The falling 
rose leaves in ^^The Maypole of Merry Mounf ' have a sug- 
gestiveness more forcible than that of obvious allegory. 

The other volumes of short stories were intended for chil- 
dren, and though excellent of their kind are not to be ranked 
among the author's important work. The 
Hawthorne's most noticeable are the adaptations of old 
C^^en^^ myths, in the Wonderboolc and the Tangle- 

wood Tales, It has been questioned whether 
such a modification of a classic story is fair or desirable. 
However this may be, it is interesting to notice the success- 
ful manner in which Hawthorne has eliminated all suggestion 
of immorality and all elements beyond the comprehension 
of children and still left in every case the essence of the 
story. In some of the myths he found an underlying moral 
not unlike those of his original New England tales. 

After his unsuccessful attempt at a romance in Fanshawe, 
Hawthorne confined himself for more than twenty years to 
the short tale or sketch. It was in the creation of these 
smaller units that he learned what he could and could not 
do, and perfected his prose style. That The Scarlet Letter 
took on the proportions of a romance is said to have been 
due to Pields's advice. Once he learned his power in the 
creation of longer stories he did not care to write short ones. 
Either the discovery of his abilities or the sudden achievement 
of success stimulated him, and the years from 1850 to 1853, 
in which he published Tlie Scarlet Letter, The House of the 
Seven Gables, and the Blithedale Romance, besides miscel- 
laneous work, were the most productive of his life. 

The central idea of The Scarlet Letter had long been in 
Hawthorne's mind, and is introduced incidentally in ^^Endi- 
cott and the Eed Cross.'' It is probable, though there is no 
direct evidence, that the story had been taking shape long 
before the loss of his office led him to put it on paper. The 



312 American Literature 

romance is prefaced by an introduction entitled ^^The Cus- 
tom House/^ and Hawthorne is quoted as saying that the 

vogue of the book was due to this preliminary 
The Scarlet sketch. This remark and the sketch itself 

Introduction show a peculiar aberration on the part of the 

author. When he wrote he was disaffected at 
the loss of his position, and this fact prejudiced his views 
of his co-workers who were so fortunate as to remain un- 
disturbed. The most regrettable remarks concern ^^a certain 
permanent Inspector.^^ Hawthorne writes of his "moderate 
proportion of intellect, and the very trifling admixture of 
moral and spiritual ingredients ; these latter qualities, indeed, 
being in barely enough measure to keep the old gentleman 
from walking on all-fours ;^^ and continues "My conclusion 
was that he had no soul, no heart, no mind ; ... It might 
be difficult — and it was so— -to conceive how he should exist 
hereafter, so earthly and sensuous did he seem.^^ Naturally 
such comments shocked the little city where the man so 
characterized had been generally known, and where his de- 
scendants still lived — especially since he had died before the 
sketch was published. In the preface to the second edition 
Hawthorne made matters worse, if possible, by saying: "It 
appears to him, that the only remarkable features of the 
sketch are its frank and genuine good-humor, and the general 
accuracy with which he has conveyed his sincere impressions 
of the characters therein described. As to enmity or ill-feel- 
ing of any kind, personal or political, he utterly disclaims 
such motives.^^ If one accepts this statement it convicts 
Hawthorne of an utter lack of taste and sense of propriety. 
The affair was evidently one of those in which men of genius 
sometimes get entangled; but it is unfortunate that The 
Scarlet Letter should have been given to the world with 
such an introduction. 

The Scarlet Letter is usually conceded to be the best of 



The Central Period 313 

the four romances. Both the theme and the setting of the 
story were suited to the author. The problem to which he 

was most strongly attracted was that of the 
The Scarlet effect of sin. The background that he used 

Plot Characters ^^^^ effectively was that of early Puritan New 

England. In The Scarlet Letter he repre- 
sented against this background the effect of one great sin on 
the four persons most intimately concerned, and on the com- 
munity. The story cannot be analyzed in the ordinary fashion. 
There is little plot or action in the usual sense of these words. 
None of the characters does anything, or except for the 
abortive attempt to fly from New England plans to do any- 
thing. Yet there is a plot of absorbing interest, in which 
the events are psychological, not physical. The most success- 
ful character in the book is Hester. She is the central figure 
of the story, and she is a type that Hawthorne could best 
portray. He pictures two sorts of women — the pale, ethereal 
kind like Priscilla and Hilda, and the full-blooded, queenly 
creatures represented by Hester, Zenobia, and Miriam. It 
is significant that he makes the former his heroines — rather 
perfunctorily, as it sometimes seems; but that though the 
Hesters and Zenobias and Miriams all sin he really enjoys 
them more and paints them more successfully. Dimmesdale, 
Hester's partner in sin, is a trifle shadowy, as is shown by 
the fact that he moves some readers to pity, others only to 
contempt. Chillingworth, who supplies the place of the vil- 
lain in a novel of action, is somewhat melodramatic in his 
psychology. Little Pearl gives the one touch of color in a 
sombre picture, and is artistically a success, though it has 
been questioned how far she is true to child nature. The 
other characters, whether viewed individually or as part of 
the cruel Puritan populace', are properly costumed and har- 
monize with the general plan. 

The romance illustrates in an especial degree the peculiar 



314 American Literature 

narrative methods that the author had been evolving. Sym- 
bolism is everywhere. The scarlet letter itself is introduced 
_- « - time after time^ and always with a new sugges- 

Letter— tiveness. The vision of the flaming symbol in 

Narrative the heavens may be an artistic mistake^ but 

the allusion to the same device on the min- 
ister's breast, with the hint at explanations not definitely 
given, is masterly. More intangible still are such touches as 
that of the rose before the prison door in the first chapter. 
Another peculiarity of the narrative is the telling, as if it 
were perfectly natural, of each character's secret thoughts. 
What no other person could ever know, what the characters 
would hardly admit to themselves, the writer narrates as 
frankly as the most obvious actions, and the reader never 
thinks of questioning. Whether or not he was a transcen- 
dentalist in avowed belief, Hawthorne proceeds in his ro- 
mances on the transcendental theory that every mind can 
comprehend the workings of every other mind. A man of 
the slightest external experience, he was able to enter into 
the feelings of the guilty man or woman, and so to portray 
them that the reader knows they would be his own emotions 
under like circumstances. The power of analyzing dark and 
sin-haunted minds is a great element in his genius. With 
brighter and happier moods he does not succeed quite so well. 
The House of the Seven Gables has the same New England 
setting, and it deals with something of the same problems 

as The Scarlet Letter, It is, however, thinner, 
The House of and leaves a less unified impression. The ac- 
Q^ljjgg tion is in the present, but interest centers 

more in the background — in the old house 
itself, in the story of its origin, of the wizard Maule's curse 
on the Pyncheon family, and of the lost title deeds. Next in 
interest for many readers are the bits of seriously playful 
description, as of the urchin who patronizes the cent-shop, of 



The Central Period 315 

the chickens in the garden, of old Hepzibah herself. Last 
in interest is the story, with its slight thread of action, end- 
ing in the removal of the curse by the inter-marriage of the 
Maule and Pyncheon families. Perhaps this slight interest 
of the story is due in part to the fact that Hawthorne was at 
the same time indulging his personal animosities and reveal- 
ing family traditions. The story of the curse and of the lost 
title deeds are from the history of the Hathornes. The por- 
trait or caricature of Judge Pyncheon is supposed to be 
recognizable as the politician who was chiefly instrumental 
in removing the author from the custom house. This latter 
fact is responsible for some faults of the story. The Judge 
is a melodramatic villain, and the scenes in which he appears, 
and especially his death, are more melodramatic than is usual 
with Hawthorne. The portrait of Hepzibah is well drawn, 
and that of Phoebe is a pleasant sketch, not very fully filled 
in. Clifford, the victim of a great wrong, is somewhat 
shadowy, and to some readers is unpleasant, rather than an 
object of pity as the author intended. The young daguerro- 
typist with his up-to-date notions is not the sort of character 
that Hawthorne could portray well, but he plays his slight 
part acceptably. Uncle Venner, the gardener, is a clever 
conception, though inferior to Silas Foster, the farmer in 
Blithedale. These deficiencies in the characters are not 
obvious at first reading, but they help to account for the 
thinness and sense of unreality felt in the story. The moral 
problems are those of heredity rather than those of personal 
sin, and their relations to actual life are not definitely pointed 
out. Suggestiveness is everywhere present — obvious as in 
the degenerate brood of chickens, more subtle in Clifford 
blowing bubbles, or the cat stealing across the garden after 
Judge Pyncheon's death. 

The Blithedale Romance differs from the other longer 
stories in motive, scene, and narrative method. Like the 



316 American Literature 

others, it shows the effect of sin, but the sin of the hero is the 
somewhat strange one of selfish philanthropy — the enthusi- 
asm of a reformer which blinds him to all 

The Blithedale ^^^^^ claims. The fault of the heroine is a 
Romance 

wayward impetuosity, derived from heredi- 
tary tendencies. The motive is more nearly that of a modern 
"problem noveF^ than are the subtle studies of conscience in 
The Scarlet Letter and The Marble Faun, The book seems 
to be the author^s comment on the movements for reform 
which were all about him in the early fifties. The scene is 
a community which is plainly that at Brook Farm, and Haw- 
thorne has drawn on his experiences for many of the inci- 
dents and some of the characters. Silas Foster is pictured 
from life, and Priscilla was clearly suggested by the little 
seamstress from Boston who is referred to in the notebooks. 
Miles Coverdale has a few of the characteristics of Hawthorne 
himself. On the first appearance of the book Zenobia was 
said to represent Margaret Fuller. However many points 
of resemblance may have been plain to contemporaries, the 
reader of to-day finds little similarity between the beautiful, 
passionate creature of the romance and the Margaret Fuller 
of the biographies. It is more likely that both Zenobia and 
HoUingsworth, in whom the author works out the results of 
their respective sins, are wholly imaginary portraits. Unlike 
the other romances the story is not told by a narrator who 
knows the secret workings of each heart, but by an eye-witness 
who can recount only what he observes, and draw his infer- 
ences. In spite of the modern setting and the ordinary story- 
teller's method, symbolism is frequent. The flower in 
Zenobia's hair is a striking example. 

Critics have so frequently spoken of Blithedale as an in- 
ferior production that the reader who questions this judgment 
probably does well to keep silence; yet he may be pardoned 
for maintaining that the inferiority is not so great as is 



The Central Period 317 

sometimes charged. The problem of the book is worthy of 
the novelist, though the reader may not agree with his solu- 
tion. The characters, with the exception of 
Rank of the Coverdale, are as life-like a group as Haw- 

Romance^ thorne ever created. Coverdale is but lightly 

sketched for the same reasons that led Poe to 
employ shadowy narrators for many of his tales. The scene, 
though somewhat abnormal, is made to seem real. The story 
moves on to an ending that is artistically inevitable. The 
general impression left by the book is one of strength, though 
it is not wholly pleasing. Of all Hawthorne's works it is the 
most pessimistic, and the pessimism is all the stronger for 
being hinted rather than definitely expressed. 

The Marble Faun followed the other romances after a con- 
siderable interval, and was in part the result of the author's 
Italian experiences. His Anglo-American 
Faun ^^ ^ romance would not take shape, and he turned 

to an Italian-American plot. The theme re- 
sembles that of The Scarlet Letter, but is broader, being no 
less than the place of sin in the development of the soul. 
The scene is Italy, but the characters are Americans, or of 
no particular nationality. Kenyon is a New England gentle- 
man who commands entire respect, but does not win the heart. 
Hilda, who has been said to be modelled after the author's 
daughter, is one of Hawthorne's pale, ethereal creatures. 
Miriam is of the other type that he loved to portray — the 
full-blooded, voluptuous woman, with a suggestion of the 
South in her nature. Donatello, though nominally an Italian, 
is the incarnation of primeval innocence and joyousness, 
rather than a definite human being. 

The Marble Faun has more action than the other romances, 
but the movement is hindered by digressions and descriptions. 
The fact that it has been commended as a guide book to 
Eome hints at its defects as a work of fiction. It is, moreover, 



318 American Literature 

a guide book written by a provincial visitor^ who retains his 
fresh enthusiasms, but who has not gained an idea of relative 
values. Excellent as many of the descriptions 
M^ ble^Fa ^ ^^^ ^^ themselves, they detract greatly from 
the effectiveness of the romance. The sug- 
gestive method, which fitted so well with the Italian back- 
ground, was employed not only in details but in the resolu- 
tion of the plot itself. Eeaders complained that the ending 
as originally written was unintelligible, and the author added 
a chapter which made no improvement. 

Hawthorne shows his New England relationships more 
clearly than any other American author, yet he was not a 
typical New Englander. He cared little for 
NeTSanr"^ formal religion, and it is impossible to de- 
termine exactly what his faith was. Although 
he was so closely associated with the transcendental leaders he 
took no real part in the transcendental movement; and he 
had no interest in the many reforms in which New Eng- 
landers were engaged. His recurrence to the thought of sin 
in the world seems at first sight a Puritan characteristic, 
but he was concerned not with forgiveness and salvation in 
the theologian^s sense, but with the effects of sin on the soul. 
In his fondness for studying the troubled conscience he 
showed a temperament which, despite the protests of those 
who knew him best, must be pronounced somewhat morbid 
and pessimistic. The best evidences of this are not his 
gloomy subjects, but little indications here and there in his 
writings. The comments on the death of Zenobia in Blithe- 
dale could have been written only by a man who felt the full 
weakness of human nature. The plucking from above 
Wordsworth^s head of ^Veeds'^ that might "have drawn their 
nutriment from his mortal remains'^ would hardly have sug- 
gested itself to a buoyant mind. The questionings that came 
to him regarding the virtue of women that he met must have 



The Central Period 319 

been inspired^ in a man so far from libertinism, by a pro- 
found distrust of human nature. Many such indications, in 
sketches, romances, and journals, indicate his lack of the hope- 
ful spirit. In every way he was a product of New England, 
but not a representative. 

His style and narrative method were his own. He was not 
a wide reader and his reading had little apparent influence 
on his writings. After Fanshawe, in which 
Hawthorne's }^q followed the fashion of leading his chapters 
Methc^ with mottoes, it is rare to find a quotation or 

a literary allusion. The influence of his con- 
temporaries was no greater. He was on intimate terms with 
few men of letters at home or abroad, and his community of 
interest with these few was not literary. The chief quality 
of his prose style is a charm that cannot be analyzed. In 
Fanshawe this is hinted at, and a few passages seem like sym- 
pathetic parodies of his later work. His individual manner 
was, however, developed during his long seclusion at Salem. 
It is seen at its best in descriptions and personal comments, 
as in some of the sketches without plot, where it is everything. 
It is most unreal in conversation. His characters express 
appropriate thoughts, but in such language as human beings 
never used. Yet even here the tone of the diction so har- 
monizes with the idea that there is little sense of unfitness; 
the characters, though stiff and unnatural in words and ac- 
tions, always seem essentially real. The peculiarities of his 
narrative method have been mentioned in connection with 
separate works. Perhaps the most striking of these are his 
assumption of almost omniscient insight into the hearts of 
his characters and his masterly handling of suggestiveness 
and symbolism. His sense of humor was but slightly and 
unequally developed, and there is sometimes a monotony of 
tone in his work; but he rarely spoils a tale by attempting 
humor unsuccessfully. 



320 American Literature 

After all has been said^ the best qualities of Hawthorne's" 

work are too subtle to be catalogued. Notwithstanding his 

provincialisms^ his morbidness^ and his occa- 

Hawthorne's gional exhibitions of bad taste, his work as a 
Rank . . ^ 

whole leaves the impression of sustained 

artistic effect. In America he has taken almost unquestioned 
rank as our greatest romancer; and although his subjects 
appeal less to European readers, and his defects are such as 
would impress European critics, his value is recognized 
abroad. 

More distinctively than Longfellow or Hawthorne, Oliver 
Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) was a product and representa- 
tive of New England culture. By birth he 
R^eT'"''^^^^ was a typical New Englander of the better 
class. On his mother's side he was a lineal 
descendant of Anne Bradstreet, and was connected in more 
or less remote degrees of cousinship with some of the best 
known families in New England. Holmes's father, a Yale 
graduate, was one of the relatively few New England clergy- 
men who clung sternly to the Calvinistic faith. He was also 
a man of letters, the possessor of a good library, the author 
of some verse, and of the Annals of America in prose. The 
mother was probably less rigid in her orthodoxy and had 
something of the vivacity so noticeable in her son. Oliver 
Wendell was born at Cambridge in 1809, the birth year, as 
he was fond of remarking, of Lincoln, Gladstone, Tennyson, 
Darwin, and other notables, among whom he might have 
included Poe. His early schooling was received at Cambridge, 
and he was sent for a year to that stronghold of orthodoxy, 
Phillips Academy at Andover. Among his early school 
fellows were several Cambridge boys and girls who were later 
to become famous, among them the younger Eichard Henry 
Dana and Margaret Fuller. Holmes was, according to his 
own picture of himself, an active, inquisitive, ingenious boy, 



The Central Period 321 

who thought much and read much^ though he rarely read a 
book through. In 1825 he entered Harvard and was gradu- 
ated with the now famous class of 1829. After the usual 
hesitation over the choice of a profession he took up law for 
a year^ but abandoned it for medicine. For two years he 
studied in Boston, and for two years in Paris, getting 
glimpses in vacation of England, Scotland, Holland, the Ehine, 
Switzerland, and Italy. His letters from Paris show that 
though he enjoyed good living and a good time, he was en- 
thusiastically devoted to his profession. On his return to 
America he opened an office in Boston, and built up a fair, 
though never a very large or remunerative, practice. He 
was, however, a successful and convincing writer of essays 
on medical topics. For two or three years he was professor 
of anatomy in Dartmouth college, a position that involved the 
delivery of a course of lectures for three months each year. 
In 1847 he was called to a professorship of anatomy in the 
Harvard medical school. 

Meanwhile, Holmes had been building up a local reputa- 
tion as a poet, an essayist, and a wit. While an undergradu- 
ate he had written poems, humorous and senti- 
wSgs^^""^^ mental, for the Harvard ^^CoUegian.^^ It 
was while he was studying law that he be- 
came indignant at the proposal to destroy the frigate ^^Consti- 
tution,^^ and made his protest in ^^Old Ironsides.^^ He also 
contributed to various periodicals articles in prose and verse. 
Two of these, which appeared in the ^^ISTew England Maga- 
zine^^ under the title of ^'The Autocrat of the Breakfast- 
Table,^^ were the precursors of the more famous series written 
later. In 1836 he published a collection of poems. 

After his appointment to the Harvard professorship 
Holmes's life was outwardly an uneventful one. For thirty- 
five years he delivered regularly his four lectures a week 
throughout the college year. During the better days of the 



322 American Literature 

lyceum movement he lectured on several subjects, among 
them the English poets of the nineteenth century. A liability 
to asthma tended to keep him at home, and 
Hohnes's Later ^^ travelled little, and rarely left New Eng- 
land, even for a short stay. He resigned from 
the professorship of anatomy in 1882 because he desired a rest 
and more time for literary work. The summer of 1886 he 
spent with his daughter in England and Paris. A pleasant 
incident of the trip was the receipt of honorary degrees from 
Oxford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh. Though threatened with 
blindness he retained some use of his eyes and almost the 
full command of his other faculties until his death. 

Holmes^s literary reputation was achieved late in life. 
In 1857, when the ^"^ Atlantic Monthly'^ was founded, he was 
a middle-aged Boston gentleman, a Harvard 
olmess professor, the author of a number of occa- 

sional poems and of some sentimental and 
humorous trifles in verse, a writer of fairly valuable and very 
readable medical essays, but by no means a notable man of 
letters. Yet it is a familiar story that Lowell insisted on 
his becoming a contributor to the new magazine. As usual, 
LowelPs instinct as an editor was true; and The Autocrat of 
the Breahfast-Table, which ran as a serial throughout the 
first twelve numbers, did more than anything else to insure 
the success of the "Atlantic.^^ This series was immedi- 
ately followed by another. The Professor at the Breahfast- 
Table, Then came The Professor's Story, issued in book 
form as Elsie Venner, and in 1867 another novel. The 
Guardian Angel. The Poet at the Breakfast-Table, pub- 
lished in 1872, completed the Breakfast-Table series. Then 
followed :a decade of literary inactivity, in which a memoir 
of Motley was the only work of importance. After the resig- 
nation from the Harvard professorship came another series 
of interesting works — the life of Emerson in 1884, A Mortal 



The Central Period 333 

Antipathy in 1884-5^ Our Hundred Days in Europe in 1887, 
Over the Tea-Cups in 1888-90. For the edition of his works 
issued in 1883 he compiled a volume of Medical Essays, and 
another of miscellaneous papers collected under the title 
Pages from an Old Volume of Life. Several volumes of 
verse appeared at different times. 

Personally as well as in ancestry Dr. Holmes was repre- 
sentative of much that was best in New England. He had 
the Yankee characteristics of mental alert- 
Holmes's ness, of ingenuity, of interest in many things. 

Characteristics "^^ ^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ always working with tools and 
contriving new devices. As a man he experi- 
mented with the microscope before it was recognized as a neces- 
sary instrument in the study of anatomy. He was an enthusi- 
astic amateur photographer in the days of the old and difficult 
wet process. He invented the ordinary hand stereoscope. Even 
in his latest years he was greatly interested in the mechanical 
ingenuity shown in such contrivances as the safety razor and 
the illuminating devices that aided his weakened vision. The 
diversity of his general interests may be seen by turning 
through a few pages of one of his discursive volumes. This 
breadth was necessarily incompatible with the greatest depth. 
Even in his specialty Dr. Holmes, though said always to 
have been abreast of the times, was not an investigator. 
That he chose his position, or at least occupied it knowingly, 
is shown in The Poet at the Brealcfast-Table and other works 
in which he paid his respects to the narrow specialist. His 
habit of reading ^^in books rather than through them" has 
been mentioned; and it was probably lack of system rather 
than lack of quantity in his reading that led him to say, 
"ISTo graduate of Harvard — or at least very few — had ever 
read less at my age than myself." 

It was also owing to his New England training that 
Holmes took great interest in theology. He early suffered a 



324 American Literature 

reaction from the strict views of his father. His professionaL 
studies gave him data not known to his neighbors, and led 

him to approach many problems from the 
Holmes's gi^g of what would now be called physiological 

Theology psychology. Of the popular N"ew England 

writers on religious subjects he was almost 
the only one who gave full weight to the revelations of 
modern science. His favorite speculations were on sin and 
moral responsibility as determined by heredity and environ- 
ment; but he had much to say on the belief in a future state, 
and the nature of the relations between God and man. These 
were his pet topics, to which he returned time after time in 
almost everything that he wrote. Much of what he said is 
generally unquestioned to-day, and the rest is nothing new; 
but at first he seemed, to the followers of his father's faith, 
a blasphemer. 

In all matters but religion Dr. Holmes was a conservative 
and something of an aristocrat. He disliked the extremists 

in reform movements, though he professed 
Holmes s ^^ -^^ ^^ sympathy with the general aims of 

many of them. His lack of interest in abo- 
lition was so noticeable that he was accused of being a pro- 
slavery man, though when the war began no one spoke more 
clearly than he in favor of the Union. His aristocratic ten- 
dencies show themselves in his frequent disquisitions on the 
subject of family and heredity, in which he called in his pro- 
fessional knowledge to reenforce his sympathies. There was 
nothing of snobbishness in all this, but rather the feeling 
which prefers the orderly, the well established, and the pleas- 
ant to the strenuous and the radical. On the other hand his 
broad S3rmpathy is shown in many ways. It was his feelings 
as much as conscious determination that led him always to 
address the duller half of his class in his lectures. When- 
ever he could he refused the ungracious task of writing lit- 



The Central Period 325 

erary criticisms. Early in his career he gained the name 
of being the best talker and diner out in Boston; and his 
geniality made it impossible to be oiSEended at his sharp 
sayings. As he grew old the differences between his belief 
and that of the orthodox church became less marked^ and this 
tended to remove the one hindrance to his being universally 
beloved. 

Dr. Holmes's best prose is seen in the Breakfast-Table 
series. The Autocrat, the first and the best — to use his own 
phrase, the first pressing of the grapes — is 
The Autocrat of made up of the best things that the author 
Table " could say, and doubtless had said at the break- 

fast and dinner tables of Boston. The form, 
that of conversation running to monologue at a table where the 
boarders represented a diversity of interests, gave a chance 
to introduce any subject, and to treat it in almost any man- 
ner. The first instalment, for example, touches on mutual 
admiration societies, the philosophy of conversation, puns, 
poetic composition, and a dozen other topics. The author's 
favorite theological ideas come in frequently. Poems are 
read by the Autocrat and others at the table. Puns, of the 
truly clever sort, are frequent, as in much of the author's 
prose and verse. Epigrams, among the best in American 
literature, are scattered here and there. Through the whole 
runs a slender thread of a love story. The characters at the 
table are lightly but admirably sketched, and the book has 
just enough unity not to be a hodgepodge, and not enough 
to prevent its being opened and read at any page. It has 
been compared to Lamb's essays, to Christopher North's 
Nodes Ambrosiance, and to various other informal books, 
but while it has resemblances to some of them it has a flavor 
and an individuality of its own. 

The Professor at the Breahfast-Tahle, which followed im- 
mediately after The Autocrat, is on the whole the least satis- 



326 American Literature 

factory of the series. The book is more serious^ which means 
that it deals more with theological controversy. It is less in 

the form of conversation or broken monologue. 
Sd5?Poet ^^^^ characters, and especially the cripple, 

Little Boston, on whom the author lavished 
much care, are less attractive than those of The Autocrat. 
Though there are many excellent quotable passages the 
general impression left by the volume is far inferior to 
that of its predecessor. The Poet at the Breahfast-Tahle, 
which concludes the series, was written after a considerable 
interval, during which the author no doubt acquired a new 
fund of witty sayings. Though inferior to The Autocrat it 
is better than The Professor, In the character of the Master 
the author created as it were a second self, wlio could make 
remarks which he hesitated to give in the first person, now 
that the speaker was so definitely identified in the public 
mind as 0. W. H. 

Dr. Holmes again adopted a form similar to that of the 
Breakfast-Table series in his last important work, Over the 

Tea-Cups. This was begun in the ^^Atlantic'^ 
T^-C^\ in 1888, but was interrupted by the death of 

his wife and his daughter, and resumed in 
1890. The greater part of it was, therefore, written after 
the author was over eighty years of age. It is inferior to 
the Breakfast-Table series, but there is nothing to suggest 
the work of a superannuated man. It is a trifle more frank 
than the earlier papers in its personal references, and is 
written, as the author says, rather for his old friends than 
for new acquaintances. It contains some allusions to his 
favorite ideas on religious and other subjects, but its frequent 
discussion of new things and new problems shows how alertly 
the author kept pace with the times. 

The first two novels deal with the same problem — that of 
inherited tendencies — and were intended to teach something 



The Central Period 327 

regarding moral responsibility. ^^Medieated fiction^^ a friend 

of the author once called them, and he often quoted the 

phrase with a protest, though with evident 

Elsi6 Venner— enjoyment of its aptness. Elsie Venner, the 
The Guardian -, . j* ±1 n i rv j* xi m i. ^ 
^ I heroine oi the first, suiters irom the eiiects oi 

a rattlesnake bite received by her mother before 
her birth, so that her nature has a strange element not human. 
The Gitardian Angel shows in a more ordinary fashion the 
culmination and power of strong family tendencies. The 
setting in both stories is in New England, and there are 
shrewd and happy portrayals of village life, which make use 
of material similar to that which Longfellow handled unsuc- 
cessfully in KavanagJi. The characters are sketchily yet 
effectively drawn, with a touch of humor, and a great deal of 
human sympathy. Miles Gridley, in The Guardian Angel, is 
a delightful creation, and some admirable epigrams are intro- 
duced as quotations from his forgotten book. The plot, 
aside from the action necessitated by the leading idea, is of 
the quiet, obvious, old-fashioned sort. This, indeed, is the 
kind of story which Holmes always used, in his novels and in 
the Breakfast-Table series — the simple love story, with stock 
hero, heroine, and villain, the action varied occasionally by 
a touch of the melodramatic, as in one episode of Elsie Ven- 
ner, The lack of a more closely knit structure and the pres- 
ence of so obvious a didactic motive are the chief defects in 
the novels. Though not great works of fiction they are 
wonderfully readable, and once read are likely to be remem- 
bered. Of the two, Elsie Venner is the more striking, but it 
contains no character so good as Miles Gridley. 

A Mortal Antipathy suffers from an extreme lack of plausi- 
bility. The story is, briefly, that of a young man who has an 
uncontrollable aversion to all young women, the result of an 
injury at the hands of a pretty girl in his infancy. The 
resolution of the plot comes when the hero, helplessly weak 



338 American Literature 

with typhoid fever, is rescued from a burning house by an- 
other pretty girl, a college athlete in bloomers. It seems 

strange that Holmes should have attempted 
Antipathy ^ ^^^^ which his keen perception must have 

told him was not only improbable but some- 
what ludicrous. He went conscientiously about the task of 
making it seem plausible, but he did not succeed. The story 
is most interesting for its sketches of two types of college 
girl, and for its reflection of the author's views on the ^^new 
woman.'' It is much more discursive than a novel is usually 
permitted to be, and may be said to stand midway between 
a romance and a work like those in the Breakfast-Table series. 
The preparation of a memoir of Motley was a difficult task, 
especially while unfortunate events in the political life of the 

historian were fresh in the public mind, and 

Holmes s j^^^ Holmes did little more than write a 

Biographies 

tribute to a friend. The life of Emerson is 

interesting as showing how the Sage of Concord was viewed 
by a friend and neighbor not in sympathy with his phi- 
losophy. Transcendentalism appealed to Holmes inasmuch 
as it stood for greater freedom of thought, but the oddities 
and extremes of the movement and its lack of repose shocked 
him. In his biography he succeeded in portraying one im- 
portant side of Emerson's character, but another side he 
could hardly understand. 

The Medical Essays, though included in the collected works, 
and readable enough, are relatively unimportant. They ex- 
press views on physiological and psychological 
Hohnes's matters which are repeated in more popular 

Sose"^''^''''^ form in the other essays. Several of them 
attack one of the Doctor's chief aversions, 
homeopathy. The Pages from an Old Volume of Life in- 
cludes a variety of papers, among them ^^My Hunt after the 
Captain," an account of a journey in search of his son, who 



The Central Period 339 

had been wounded at Antietam, and ^^Cinders from the Ashes/^ 
a short paper containing some interesting recollections of his 
early life. The least important of his volumes is Our Hun- 
dred Days in Europe, in which he writes of his summer in 
England. With its testimonials to asthma cures and patent 
razors, its minute chronicle of goings, comings, and social 
attentions, this seems unworthy of ^^The Autocrat.^^ If it had 
not been followed four years later by the bright and thought- 
ful Over the Tea-Cups it might have led to the belief that 
the author was lapsing into the painful garrulity of old age. 
As a poet Holmes showed his conservative tendency. He 
was fond of the heroic couplet and continued to write it 

throughout life. He disliked the ^^rattlety- 
ohnes as a bang sort of verse,^^ as, in a goodnatured letter 

to Lowell, he characterized the metre of ^^Sir 
Launfal.^^ He wrote /^metrical essays,^^ and his lyrics were 
often of the mildly sentimental sort, with the quiet good 
taste of an old-fashioned gentleman. As an occasional poet 
he has been unequalled in America. His poems for the class 
of ^29 and for many societies and anniversaries fill a consider- 
able space in his works; and all have the merit of special 
fitness for the occasion, while a few possess an enduring 
quality. Those best known are of the lyric order, such as 
"Bill and Joe,^^ and "The Boys,^^ both among the class poems. 
The longer didactic pieces, with their happy mixture of 
humor and sense, are of a kind that has gone out of fashion; 
but "Poetry; a Metrical Essay'^ and "A Ehymed Lesson^^ 
contain many quotable couplets. Many of the early poems 
and a few of the later ones are wholly humorous. Holmes is 
at his best, however, in the blending of humor and pathos, 
as in "The Last Leaf,^^ or of humor and material for solid 
thought, as in "The Deacon^s Masterpiece'^ — better known as 
"The One-Hoss Shay.'' A poem of this latter sort, in which 
the humor predominates, was "The Broomstick Train," writ- 



330 American Literature 

ten when the author was over eighty^ and as fresh and in- 
genious as his boyhood verses. Of the purely serious poems 
"The Chambered Nautilus/^ first given in The Autocrat, 
is the best known^ and was the author^s favorite. Its great 
vogue is probably due to the obvious moral lesson in the last 
stanza^ but for a poem of its kind it is almost flawless. The 
long "Wind-Clouds and Star-Drifts/^ published section by 
section in TJie Poet at the Breakfast-Table, is smooth, land 
phrases well the author^s beliefs. Many of the short poems 
are of the sort sometimes called society verse — the brief treat- 
ment in perfect taste of subjects neither too serious nor too 
trivial. Holmes had an old-fashioned fondness for pathos, 
which is often shown in his prose, and in such poems as 
"The Voiceless^^ and "Under the Violets/^ but he usually 
saved himself from sentimentality by the introduction of 
humor. 

In discussing Dr. Holmes^s rank as a man of letters it is 
perhaps well to begin with sweeping concessions. He was not 

a great scholar, a great moral teacher, a great 
Holmes's Rank , , • j. tt ^ • ;i x 

poet, or a great essayist. He did not repre- 
sent the aggressive spirit of the time. He was to a consider- 
able extent provincial. On the other hand he was a kindly, 
genial, observing man, with a gift of happy expression in 
prose and verse. He is always suggestive, if not deep. He 
made a personal impression on his hearers and readers. For 
this reason he occupies an important and in some respects a 
unique place in American literature. Many a critic who 
would unhesitatingly concede all the limitations that have 
been mentioned picks up Holmes's poems and The Autocrat 
more frequently and with more pleasure than the works of 
any other American poet or essayist. In the great variety 
which these works offer there is something for every mood 
except that of the deepest thought, and perhaps suggestions 
even for that. And whatever is there is given with the in- 



The Central Period 331 

describable quality which we call perfect taste, and which 
marks the author as a gentleman. 

The six greater New England writers^^Emerson, Whittier, 
Lowell, Longfellow, Hawthorne, and Holmes, were all of 

old New England ancestry and, with the ex- 
Lesser ception of Longfellow, were all born in eastern 
Authors Massachusetts. AH but Whittier spent their 

active lives within twenty miles of Boston and 
Harvard college, and Whittier was but little farther away. 
All of them were on terms of pleasant acquaintanceship, and 
they met frequently in Boston, especially after the founding 
of the ^^Atlantic Monthly.^^ Besides these men and their 
contemporaries who have already been mentioned there were 
many other Massachusetts writers who were of importance in 
their day, and a considerable number of whom deserve to be 
remembered. Among those who were associated with what 
may be called the main literary set were James T. Fields, 
E. H. Dana, Jr., Edward Everett Hale, J. T. Trowbridge, 
Charles Eliot Norton, Samuel Longfellow, E. T. S. Lowell, 
William Ware, Harriet Prescott Spofford, and Elizabeth 
Stuart Phelps Ward. 

James T. Fields (1817-1881) was born in New Hampshire, 
but went to Boston when a young man, and for over thirty 

years was a member of the leadinsf publishinsc 

firm of that city. Unlike most of the New 
England literary men he did not have a college education; 
but he was a wide reader, and he had the instincts of a biblio- 
phile and a collector. As publisher, and as editor of the 
''Atlantic Monthly'' from 1862 to 1870, he became the help- 
ful friend of many American men of letters. During fre- 
quent visits to England he made the acquaintance of leading 
English writers. His most valuable work is Yesterdays with 
Authors, first published in 1872. In this he writes of 
Thackeray, Hawthorne, Dickens, Wordsworth, Miss Mitford, 



333 American^ Literature 

and Barry Cornwall^, all of whom he had known. The papers 
are gossipy and appreciative rather than critical^ but have 
real value. Underljrusli is a collection of miscellaneous essays 
and sketches^ some of them containing partly successful at- 
tempts at humor^ and some, like a paper on ^^Diamonds and 
Pearls/^ the gleanings of a reader in out-of-the-way places. 
His poems contain some old favorites of the school readers, 
with humorous turns and moral lessons, but are of slight 
importance. As publisher, editor, lecturer, and center of a 
literary circle Fields rendered services to American litera- 
ture altogether incommensurable with the value of his own 
writings. 

Eichard Henry Dana, Jr. (1815-1882), abolitionist, writer 
on international law, and occasional contributor to the ^^North 

American Eeview,^^ owes his permanent 
Dana^Tr"^^^^ literary reputation to one book. Two Years 

Before the Mast, This tells the story of the 
author^s experiences on a cruise which he made to California 
for the purpose of regaining his health. It was published 
in 1840, and remains the best portrayal of sea life in the old 
days of American sailing vessels. The style is graphic, and 
the facts, though evidently uncolored, are so told that they 
have the charm of a romance. 

Edward Everett Hale (1822-1909) came of a family that 
had been distinguished since the early days of Massachusetts 

Bay. After his graduation from Harvard at 
war verett ^-^^ ^^^ ^£ seventeen he entered the ministry 

in 1842, and became pastor of a Unitarian 
church in Boston in 1856. For almost seventy years he was 
active in many ways — as preacher, lecturer, philanthropist, 
social reformer, editor, historian, biographer, essayist, and 
story writer. He was a frequent contributor to magazines, 
and the number and variety of his published volumes seems 
incredible until one remembers how long and persistently 



The Central Period 333 

he wrote. Though prolific, he was not a hasty or at least 
not a slovenly writer. His style was always easy and indi- 
vidual, and though he may seem a trifle garrulous in some 
of his later work he never loses his charm. As an historian 
he was accurate and reasonably thorough, but he had not the 
time and perhaps not the temper for deep investigation. 
His FranMin in France and other historical writings will 
probably be superseded ; and his essays and novels can hardly 
last. His pleasant and gossipy recollections of N"ew England 
men and affairs will long be a delight to students of these sub- 
jects, though for concise criticism and statement of fact they 
will go to other authorities. Perhaps his work which is most 
likely to live is his short stories. "My Double, and How he 
Undid Me,^' published in the "Atlantic'^ in 1859, showed 
clever and ingenious humor. "The Man without a Country,'^ 
written during the Civil War, is a masterly story, and deserves 
to be remembered not only for its lesson of patriotism but 
for its literary art. The feeling is intense, yet never seems 
over-done ; and the verisimilitude is so great that the tale has 
been taken for history. 

John Townsend Trowbridge (1827- ), another late sur- 
vivor of the early "Atlantic^^ group, is a native of New York, 

but removed to Boston about 1848. He is 
Trowbridffe most successful in stories for boys, and Cud jo's 

Cave and the "Jack Hazard^^ stories are now 
being enjoyed by the sons and grandsons of those who first 
delighted in them. His work for adults is on the whole less 
valuable, though the "Vagabonds^^ and one or two other 
poems are commonly known, and some of his novels were 
popular in their day. My Own Story, a late book of reminis- 
cences, is both readable and valuable to the student of literary 
history. 

Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908) is better known as a 
•translator and editor than as a creative author, but filled 



\ 



334 American Literature 

an important place in the N"ew England literary set. He was 
born at Cambridge^, graduated at Harvard^ and for many 

years occupied a chair in that college. He 
and Critk^^ ^^^^^ made a journey to India, and spent 

much time in Europe. Besides editing the 
correspondence of Carlyle and Emerson and the letters of 
Lowell he translated Dante, and published several works on 
artistic and literary topics. Edwin Percy Whipple (1819- 
1886) was another man of literary interests, whose writings 
are now but little read. He held a business clerkship in 
Boston when in 1843 he attracted attention by an article 
on Macaulay, modelled somewhat on the style of that author. 
He soon won a reputation as an essayist and lyceum lecturer, 
and was one of the most respected critics of his day. Among 
his volumes are Essays and Reviews^ 1848-9, Literature and 
Life, 1849, The Literature of the Age of Elizabeth, 1876. 
It is now difficult to understand the basis of Whipple's con- 
temporary reputation. He was a conscientious critic, with 
fairly definite though narrow canons of judgment, and he 
tried to write in an entertaining way; but his essays show 
neither keen insight nor effective phrasing. Doubtless his 
fame was helped by the fact that he was a self-educated man, 
by his success as a popular lecturer, and perhaps by his style, 
which was modelled on that of the favorite essayist of the day, 
Macaulay. 

Samuel Longfellow (1819-1892), younger brother of the 
more distinguished poet, was a graduate of Harvard and [a 

Unitarian clergyman. He made important 

contributions to hymnology, both as author 
and editor, and he also wrote the life of his brother. Samuel 
F. Smith (1808-1895), a member of the famous Harvard 
class of 1829, and later a Baptist clergyman and an editor, 
wrote several hymns, and other poems, but is remembered 
only as the author of ^^My Country, 'tis of thee." 



The Central Period 335 

Eobert Traill Spence Lowell (1816-1891), elder brother 
of James Eussell Lowell, was a graduate of Harvard college 

and Harvard medical school, but later be- 
^^FUi^^^*^^^ came an Episcopal clergyman. He served 

parishes in the Bermudas, Newfoundland, 
New York, and New England, and was for a time professor 
of Latin in Union College. He wrote poems which, while 
they never reach the heights, are musical and admirably 
sustained. More important are his stories. The New Priest 
in Conception Bay, Anthony Brade, and A Story or two 
from a Dutch Town, The New Priest in Conception Bay, his 
most important work, has for its setting the fishing village 
in Newfoundland where he was stationed. It is a strong 
story, with vivid character painting, but suffers from the 
fact that it is written with a sectarian purpose. William 
Ware (1797-1852), another Harvard graduate and Unitarian 
clergyman, published three historical or semi-historical novels 
—Zenohia, or the Fall of Palmyra (first published as Letters 
from Palmyra), Aurelian (first published as Probus), and 
Julian, or Scenes in Judea. In each of these the story is 
told in letters purporting to be written by one of the principal 
characters. The author makes a conscientious attempt to 
re-create ancient scenes, and his results are in some ways 
praiseworthy; but the length of his stories, the artificiality 
of his form, and the lack of a light touch interfere with his 
success. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward (1844-1911), who 
published over her maiden name, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, 
was a precocious Andover girl who was a contributor 
to "The Youth's Companion'^ at the age of thirteen, and to 
"Harper's Monthly'' before she was twenty. Her many 
stories, sketches, and essays have most of them a moral aim. 
The Gates Ajar, her most popular work, is an imaginative 
presentation of the possibilities of the future life, and was 
inspired by the death of her brother. Louise Chandler 



336 American Literature 

Moulton (1835-1908) was a native of Connecticut, but after 
her marriage lived in Boston. She wrote much for periodi- 
cals, and published some twenty volumes of fiction, essays, 
and poems. 

Somewhat younger than the authors who have been men- 
tioned was Louisa M. Alcott (1832-1888), daughter of Amos 
Bronson Alcott. The hardships which that 
L ^^a M^ Al^t ^^^^^^^ transcendentalist brought upon his 
family gave her valuable training and fur- 
nished material for some of her later literary work. She 
early wrote verses, plays, and stories, some of which were 
published, but her first work of importance was Hospital 
Sketches, issued in 1863. This told of the author^s experi- 
ences during a few weeks as army nurse in Washington. In 
1869 it was reprinted with the addition of a group of "Camp 
and Fireside Stories.^^ It is said that some of Miss Alcott^s 
earliest tales had been of the ultra-sensational kind, and a 
few of those in this group show a trace of melodrama. Others 
abound in graphic and detailed description, and show an ir- 
repressible sense of humor. She really found herself in the first 
of her long series of juvenile stories. Little Women, published 
in 1868. Many of these tales are cleverly realistic pictures 
of New England life as she had known it. It is usually said 
that she wrote for girls, as Trowbridge wrote for boys; but 
young people of both sexes enjoy her bright and wholesome 
books. 

Other writers whose literary work was not fairly begun 
until after the close of the Civil War were John Fiske, 
Charles Dudley Warner, and Horace E. Scud- 
John Fiske .^^^^ j^^^ -p.gj^^ (1842-1901) holds a unique 

place as a scholarly expositor and popularizer of philosophy 
and history. He was born in Hartford, was graduated at 
Harvard, and lived most of his later life at Cambridge. He 
had a brief connection with Harvard college after his gradu- 



The Central Period 337 

ation, but his advancement was prevented by rumors of his 
atheism. Later he engaged in lecturing, and was nonresident 
professor of history in Washington University, St. Louis. 
Throughout life his interests were broad, but he was 
first attracted chiefly by the theory of evolution, and after- 
ward by American history. Before 1885 he published a 
number of books on philosophical topics, which had great 
influence in interpreting the views of Darwin and Spencer 
to Americans. Between 1888 and his death he wrote a num- 
ber of historical works. The chief characteristic of all his 
writings is their great clearness. He had a remarkable 
faculty of stating difficult matters for the common man 
without serious loss of scholarly accuracy. 

Charles Dudley Warner (1829-1900) was born in western 
Massachusetts, and was graduated from Hamilton college in 

1851, and from the University of Pennsyl- 
Later Minor yania law school in 1856. After practicing his 

profession in Chicago for four years he turned 
to journalism, and later was one of the editors of Harper's 
Magazine. His first book to gain attention was My Summer 
in a Garden, a collection of light newspaper sketches pub- 
lished in 1870. From this time until his death he wrote 
voluminously. Several of his books are accounts of travel, 
some are fiction, and some are miscellaneous essays. Being a 
Boy, one of his most pleasing books, is full of autobiographi- 
cal reminiscences. The Gilded Age he wrote in collaboration 
with Mark Twain. He was general editor of the American 
Men of Letters series, to which he contributed the volume on 
Irving. He was a journalist of the best type, a man of wide 
interests, of literary taste, and though genial, of sternly up- 
right principles. His work is simple, homely, and humorous — 
charming reading for a summer's day, but without very dis- 
tinctive qualities. Horace E. Scudder (1838-1902), a native 
of Boston and a graduate of Williams college, was for many 



338 American Literature 

years literary adviser of the leading publishing house of New- 
England and edited some of the more important series issued 
by that firm. From 1890 to 1898 he was editor of the ''At- 
lantic Monthly/^ His earlier writings were largely for 
children, and he always took an interest in child life and in 
juvenile literature. His most important work was the Life 
of James Russell Lowell, and' he wrote other biographies 
and essays. 

Several Massachusetts authors vfere, because of tempera- 
ment or circumstances of residence, less closely associated 
with the group that centered about Boston, 
Harvard college, and the ''x^tlantic Monthly/^ 
Josiah Gilbert Holland (1819-1881) w^as a Yankee w^ho tried 
keeping waiting school, taking daguerreotypes, teaching, and 
practicing medicine, and finally found his calling in editing a 
new^spaper and giving general good advice. At the age of 
thirty he became associate editor of the ''Springfield Eepub- 
lican,^^ and did much to develop the reputation of that paper. 
After 1870 he lived in New York and edited "Scribner's 
Monthly.^^ His first work to attract attention was Timothy 
TitcomVs Letters to Young People, Married and Single, 
published in the "Springfield Eepublican^^ and collected in 
book form in 1858. This was followed the same year by 
Bitter-Sweet, a dramatic poem, and later by Kathrina, a long 
narrative poem. Lessons in Life, Plain Talks on Familiar 
Subjects, Gold Foil Hammered from Popular Proverbs, a 
Life of Lincoln, Arthur Bonnicastle, a novel, and many 
more. Dr. Holland^s great popularity as a lyceum lecturer 
and the immense sales of his books indicate that he had a 
message for many of his contemporaries; and his works are 
still in print. His ideals were true, and he stated them 
strongly, apparently unconscious that they were commonplace. 
His prejudices, his religious narrowness, a sort of cheap 
reverberating quality of his style, and his use of up-to-date if 



The Central Period 339 

not slangy expressions no doubt helped to impress his moral 
on readers of a certain class. His poems teach the same 
lessons as his prose^ but they move from beginning to end 
without a touch of inspiration. He is an example of the 
author who has a contemporary reputation and an influence 
wholly disproportioned to the artistic value of his work. 

Thomas William Parsons (1819-1892) was a native of Bos- 
ton. During several years of his early manhood he lived 
in Italy^ where he became interested in Dante^ 

Thomas William ^^^ published a verse translation of the 
Parsons ^ 

first ten cantos of the Inferno in 184:3. He 

adopted the supposedly unpoetic profession of dentistry^ 
which he practiced in Boston^ and afterward in London. He 
completed the translation of the Inferno in 1867^ and issued 
a number of small volumes of original verse^, some of them 
privately printed. A selection from these was published as 
Poems the year after his death. The translation of Dante 
has been highly praised by competent scholars^ and impresses 
the reader who does not know the original as the loving, 
painstaking work of a man with the poef s instinct. Par- 
sons was a poet^s poet, and he wrought little, but with great 
care and exquisite taste. His best known poem, ^^On a 
Bust of Dante,^^ is one of the few flawless lyrics written by 
an American. Though never widely popular, he was one of 
the truest artists among minor American writers of verse. 

Another self-exiled American who wrote poetry as an avo- 
cation was William Wetmore Story (1819-1895), the lawyer 

and artist. He was a native of Salem and a 
W^tm^ St graduate of Harvard. After being admitted 

to the bar he published several legal treatises 
of recognized authority. In 1848 he went to Italy, where he 
resided for the rest of his life, and attained international 
fame as a sculptor. He possessed an attractive personality, 
his interests were wide, and his writings touch many sub- 



340 American Literature 

jects. His poems were produced at various times throughout 
his life. After he went abroad he published a play or two 
and some prose works^ among them Roia di Roma, or Walks 
and Talks about Rome, and Conversations in a Studio, His 
verse was obviously influenced by Browning. He made fre- 
quent use of the dramatic monologue^ and succeeded well with 
the broken blank verse that fits this kind of composition. 
^^A Roman Lawyer in Jerusalem/^ a defense of Judas, is the 
longest and the most ingenious of his exercises in psychological 
analysis. His most familiar poem, ^^Cleopatra/^ shows some- 
thing of the same treatment in briefer compass and lighter 
measure. Some of his lyrics are well sustained and indeed 
all his work is usually pleasing and in good taste. 

Among the minor poets whose names are occasionally re- 
called was George Lunt (1803-1885), a Newburyport lawyer 
and editor. He published several volumes of 

ore inor verse, but all is now forgotten except a lyric 

or two. Frances Sargent Osgood (1811-1850) 
was the daughter of a Boston merchant, but after her mar- 
riage lived in London and New York. Mrs. Osgood is per- 
haps now best remembered because of Poe^s extravagant praise 
of her work, yet her contemporary fame was considerable. 
Her poems are most of them sentimental lyrics, often intense, 
and often with an element of over-fanciful imagination. The 
quality which attracted Poe was doubtless her smoothness 
and facility in versification. Epes Sargent (1813-1880), a 
descendant of a prominent New England family, was a pains- 
taking editor and compiler, and the author of many original 
works of various kinds. Several of his plays were put on the 
stage and his tales for young people once had considerable 
vogue. John Boyle O'Eeilly (1844-1890) was a native of 
Ireland who escaped from Australia, where he had been trans- 
ported for treason. He became editor of the "Boston Pilot," 
and was noted as .a public speaker and a poet. His verses 



The Central Period 341 

show a Celtic fluency, and are characterized by smoothness, and 

many aphoristic lines and couplets. 

The instinct for historical writing had been strong in 

Massachusetts since the days of Bradford and Winthrop, and 

four Massachusetts men, Prescott, Bancroft, 

"^^^ Motley, and Parkman, produced histories that 

Massachusetts . . , , ^'^. > ah 

Historians ^^^ ^ ^^ important as literature. All were 

of old New England stock, born within a few 
miles of Boston, and graduated at Harvard college. Two of 
them, Prescott and Motley, devoted themselves to European 
history, though they chose subjects that had some connection 
with America ; and two, Bancroft and Parkman, chose Ameri- 
can themes. 

William Hickling Prescott (1796-1859) was a native of 
Salem, and in 1811 entered college as a sophomore. The 
William ^^^^ J^^^ he was struck by a piece of bread 

Hickling thrown by a fellow student at commons, and 

Prescott received injuries that resulted in the blind- 

ness of one eye and great weakness of the other. He had been 
a fair student, and the faculty showed him some considera- 
tion, so that he was able to receive his degree. He spent 
some time in travel and contributed a few papers to the 
"North American Eeview^^ and other magazines. His finan- 
cial circumstances were such that he might have lived without 
definite employment, but he rejected this possibility and re- 
solved to become a writer. To make up for the deficiencies of 
his college training he outlined a course of study, most of 
which he carried out. After much consideration he decided 
on a subject from Spanish history, and in 1837 published his 
Ferdinand and Isabella. He then turned naturally to The 
Conquest of Mexico, the theme of which Irving generously 
relinquished to him, and afterward to The Conquest of Peru, 
Before his death he had completed three of four projected 
volumes on Philip the Second, 



342 American Literature 

Prescott's methods of study and composition were de- 
termined by his infirmity. He could not himself ransack 
libraries and manuscript collections^ or even 
resco ^ visit with profit the places where these au- 

thorities were found. He never went to 
Spain^ Mexico^ or Peru. Fortunately he had both influence 
and money^ and was able to engage the best copyists and to 
secure for them admission to the most valuable collections. 
The results of their labors were brought to his darkened 
study and used with the aid of readers. After he had 
planned a work he got in mind the facts relating to a single 
topic, and thought out the details and even the phraseology 
before a line was written. In Ferdinand and Isabella every 
sentence is elaborated as if it were intended as a textbook 
example of its type. Later he gained greater ease, but he 
always gave the impression of studious care. His methods 
of work also affected the value of his history as history, though 
he recognized the difficulties under which he labored and 
tried to overcome them. It is a common charge that he 
painted his historical pictures with too gorgeous coloring. 

John Lothrop Motley (1814-1877) was born at Dorchester, 
a half generation younger than Prescott. After a brilliant 
though not very diligent career at Harvard, 
SSe^''*^'^^ he studied at Berlin and Goettingen. His 
first two volumes were novels. The earlier, 
Morton's Hope, is partly autobiographical, and in some places 
has a little of the fiavor of Wilhelm Meister, Merry Mount 
is historical fiction. At an early date he had written a re- 
view article or two on historical subjects, and he began sys- 
tematic study of the history of the Dutch Eepublic. On learn- 
ing that Prescott intended a work on Philip the Second he 
was tempted to give up, but Prescott encouraged him, as 
he had himself been encouraged by Irving under similar! 
circumstances. From 1851 to 1856 he worked among thd 



The Central Period 343 

manuscript collections of Europe and finished The Rise of 
the Dutch Republic in 1856. In 1860 he published two 
volumes of The United Netherlands and completed the work 
in 1868. Meanwhile he had been for a time minister to 
Austria and in 1869 was made minister to England. In both 
positions he had serious trouble, which led to bitter and 
confusing newspaper controversy. After his summary recall 
from England he wrote a life of John of Barneveldt, and 
planned a work on the Thirty Years^ War which his failing 
health did not allow him to prepare. Motley was a careful 
and thorough student, and any defects of his w^ork come 
rather from his personality than from his methods. He 
seems to have had the temper of an advocate rather than that 
of a judge, and perhaps that of a dramatist more than either. 
When he considered historical questions analogous to those 
in the United States he was somewhat of a partizan, and he 
was likely to sympathize with the most picturesque character. 
His history always has a hero. 

George Bancroft (1800-1891), the elder of the two his- 
torians who chose American themes, was born in Worcester. 

He was one of the first of the Harvard men to 

George Bancroft i i - n ^ • i xi t 

^ study m Germany and received the degree 

of Ph.D. from Goettingen in 1820. In 1822-3 he was tutor in 
Greek at Harvard, and in the latter year published a volume 
of poems. He had, however, already determined to devote 
himself to history, and in 1834 he published the first volume 
of his History of the United States, This history was his 
chief literary task throughout life, though his work upon it 
was much interrupted by his participation in politics. He was 
successively collector of the port of Boston, secretary of the 
navy, and minister to England and to Germany. After 
1849 he lived in New York. Twelve volumes of his history 
appeared at intervals until 1882, the last bringing the narra- 
tive to the adoption of the constitution. The final revised 



344 American Literature 

edition was published in 1884-5. His other writings are 
mostly magazine articles and occasional addresses. 

Bancroft differed from most of his New England con- 
temporaries in being a democrat, and his political beliefs 
influenced both his views of history and his 

T ^*°^^^ ^ *t. J style. He was much of a moralist, as is shown 
Literary Method ^ ^ 

by some of his earliest essays. He inter- 
preted history in the light of his views on life and govern- 
ment, and thus to a certain extent laid himself open to the 
charge of partizanship. His style, especially in the earlier 
volumes, had something of the heightened quality that was 
affected by the democrats rather than the federalists. He 
was, however, a thorough and conscientious investigator, 
trained even more than most of his contemporaries in the 
methods of German scholarship. If his history is not abso- 
lutely impartial it is not because of any deliberate misrepre- 
sentation or coloring. 

Francis Parkman (1823-1893) was born in Boston, and 
after his graduation from Harvard studied law, but never 
practiced. In 1846 he went on an extended 
rancis ^^-p -{;]^j.Q^g]^ i\^q wilderness west of the Mis- 

sissippi, and improved every opportunity to 
become familiar with the life of the hunter, the guide, and the 
Indian. His account of this trip, first published in the 
"Knickerbocker Magazine,^^ and afterward issued as The Cali- 
fornia and Oregon Trail, is an unusually interesting narra- 
tive of personal adventure. Two years later he published his 
first historical work. The Conspiracy of Pontiac, His health 
was never good, and was permanently impaired by exposure 
and over exertion during his first visit to the West. Much ot 
the time he was wholly unable to use his eyes, and anotherj 
affliction deprived him for a time of the use of hisf 
limbs. While in a depressed state of mind after the comple-j 
tion of The Conspiracy of Pontiac he wrote a novel. Vassal 



The Central Period 345 

Morton, published in 1856^ but omitted from his collected 
works. This is slightly melodramatic in plot^ and is evi- 
dently in a degree autobiographical. At a later time he turned 
to horticulture as an out-door avocation. He published a 
book on roses in 1866^ and in 1871-2 was professor of horti- 
culture at Harvard. In spite of all difficulties he persevered 
in his historical work^ and produced a series of volumes cover- 
ing the entire conflict between France and England for su- 
premacy in the New World. Those that followed The Conspir- 
acy of Pontiac were Pioneers of France in the New World, 
1865 ; The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Cen- 
tury, 1867; La Salle: or The Discovery of the Great West, 
1869 ; The Old Regime in Canada, 1874; Count Frontenac and 
New France under Louis XIV, 1877; Montcalm and Wolfe, 
1884; and A Half-Century of Conflict, 1892. In the prepara- 
tion of these works Parkman made five trips to Prance to ex- 
amine authorities^ and visited nearly every part of America in 
which the scenes of his histories are laid. He combined in a 
remarkable degree the accurate method and impartial sense of 
a modern historian with a keen observation of nature and 
man, and an eye for the picturesque. His works are of un- 
questioned value as authorities, and his style has a finish and 
charm hardly to be found in the work of any other American 
historian of equal scholarly rank. He wrote narrative rather 
than philosophical history, yet his analyses of causes and of 
great movements are sufficient and sound. 

Several of the Massachusetts publicists and orators have 

been discussed in other connections, and a few more deserve 

mention. Eufus Choate (1799-1859), a law- 

u icists and ^^^ ^^^ ^^^ ^^^ term United States senator 

from Massachusetts, was a man of brilliant 
and magnetic personality. He was a devoted student of the 
classics, and he deliberately applied the results of his studies 
to the development of his own style, not always with fortu- 



346 American Literature 

nate effects. In some orations he uses long and involved 
sentences in which the reader becomes entangled, though his 
delivery is said to have concealed the defect. He belongs on 
the whole to the same group of orators as Webster ; but he had 
more brilliancy and less weight and dignity, and his power 
probably depended more on his personal manner. Though 
his speeches are still traditionally classic they are little read, 
and have little influence on modern public speaking. Charles 
Francis Adams (1807-1886), son of John Quincy Adams, 
had a long public career, the most important incident of which 
was the ministry to England under President Lincoln. In 
his younger days he contributed articles on literary and mis- 
cellaneous subjects to the ^^North American Eeview;^^ he 
edited with great care the works of his father and his grand- 
father, and wrote their memoirs ; he published some political 
pamphlets; and he delivered many orations and addresses. 
The frank determination and the literary tastes and interests 
which had characterized the earlier members of tlie family 
are seen to a considerable extent in all these works. Charles 
Sumner (1811-1874) was the son of an old ISTew England 
family, a graduate of Harvard, a student of literature, and in 
his day the ^^scholar in politics^^ from Massachusetts. A 
Fourth of July oration, ^^On the True Grandeur of Nations,^^ 
in which he opposed war, attracted much attention. After 1850 
almost all his speeches were on political questions; but he 
continued to keep his interest in literature, and was a life- 
long intimate of Longfellow and others of the Cambridge 
literary set. The discussion of his long service in the senate, 
with the sensational assault by Brooks, and the later aliena- 
tion from his party, belongs to political history. The fifteen 
volumes of his works offer little attraction to the ordinary 
reader. They are made up largely of speeches in the senate. 
His formal addresses before that body were usually four 
hours in length and were in a style that has been called 



The Central Period 347 

^^architectural/^ This epithet is apt in the sense that they 
were built up with great labor^ not that they were admirable 
in proportion. His style was formal, and his use of many quo- 
tations and allusions was in a manner already almost obsolete. 

The literary work in the other New England states was 
far inferior to that in Massachusetts. Connecticut still held 
the second place with a few minor poets and 
Connecticut — several prose writers of more importance. Of 
Mitchell ^^^ latter perhaps Donald Grant Mitchell 

(1822-1908) shows most markedly the char- 
acteristics that have been seen in earlier Connecticut writers, 
though he also has some resemblance in both temper and 
literary manner to Irving. He was born in Norwich and 
was graduated from Yale in 1841. His first writings were 
sketches of European travel and light satirical essays. In 
1850 he published, over the pen-name ^^Ik Marvel/^ Reveries 
of a Bachelor, and the next year Dream Life, These books 
can be described neither as romances nor as personal essays, 
but have some of the characteristics of both. They 
partly tell and partly imply a story, but the narrative ele- 
ment is not predominant. Reveries of a Bachelor^ especially, 
is a charming embodiment of the old-fashioned genial and 
delicate sentimentalism at its best. After serving for a 
time as United States consul at Venice, Mitchell settled in 
1855 at Edgewood, a farm near New Haven, where he lived 
until his death. He writes of this in My Farm of Edgewood, 
Wet Days at Edgewood, and other volumes that combine ap- 
preciation of nature, practical observations on farming, and 
gleanings from the georgic writings of English and classic 
poets. His English Lands, Letters, and Kings, and American 
Lands and Letters are literary criticism with a strong personal 
element. 

Mitchell is said to have been annoyed that the public pre- 
ferred Reveries of a Bachelor to his later writings; and 



348 American Literature 

many of his warmest admirers give first rank to such volumes 
as Wet Days at Edgewood, It is probable^ however, that the 
public is right, and that though the earlier volumes belong 
to a kind of literature now out of fashion they have more 
real vitality than the author's slightly self-conscious writings 
as gentleman farmer or as amateur critic. All MitchelFs 
work, however, is delicate in manner and pervaded by lan 
air of leisurely culture that is too rare in American books. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896), though at different 
times resident in many places, fairly belongs to Connecticut. 
She was born in Litchfield, the daughter of 
^towi^*^^^''^^'' the Eeverend Lyman Beecher, one of the 
strongest of the New England clergymen who 
clung to Trinitarian Congregationalism, and the sister of a 
still more distinguished clergyman, Henry Ward Beecher. 
Her mother died four years after her birth, and her father, 
though he married twice afterward, took chief charge of her 
education. Numerous anecdotes are told of the homely, 
simple, humorous life of the family. The children were 
allowed a wider course of reading than some Calvinists would 
have approved, and Mrs. Stowe remembered especially her 
experiences with the Arabian Nights, Scott, and Byron. 

Dr. Beecher was called to a conservative pulpit in Boston, 
and in 1832 to the presidency of a theological seminary in 
Cincinnati. Here Harriet became intimate with Mrs. Calvin 
E. Stowe, wife of a professor in the seminary; and after her 
friend's death in 1834 her efforts to console the husband led 
to an engagement and her marriage in 1836. Professor 
Stowe afterward accepted calls in the East, first at Bowdoin 
college, Brunswick, Maine, and then at Andover theological 
seminary; and in 1864 the family settled permanently at 
Hartford. After the war they also had a winter home in 
Florida. 

Before her marriage Mrs. Stowe had published a geography 



The Central Period 349 

and done some other slight work with her pen ; and although 
her health was poor, and limited means imposed on her a 
large share of household duties, she continued 
nee oms ^^ write occasionally. It was just after her 
removal to Brunswick, that she began the com- 
position of Uncle Tom's Cabin. During her residence in Cin- 
cinnati she had seen much of slavery across the border, and 
she had visited friends in the slave states. She always be- 
lieved slavery an evil, but she was not at first an abolitionist, 
and even after her convictions became more intense she was 
never guilty of the vindictive sentiments shown by many 
northerners who knew nothing of the South at first hand. 
In Uncle Tom's Cabin she tried to show the bright as well 
as the dark side of slavery; and she pictured the most brutal 
slave-master and the woman with the most unreasonable race 
prejudice as northerners. Indeed, she was surprised that 
opposition to the book came from the South rather than from 
the radical abolitionists, whom she thought she was too mild 
to please. 

The inspiration to write Uncle Tom's Cabin came from a 
desire to arouse interest in the evils of slavery, supplemented 
by a purpose to increase the meagre family income. The 
work grew to completion slowly, during the few spare mo- 
ments of a busy housewife. It first appeared serially during 
1851-3 in the ^^National Era,^^ an abolitionist paper of small 
circulation published in Washington. As soon as it was 
completed it was issued in book form at Boston, and achieved 
remarkable success. Statistics are somewhat conflicting, but 
it is usually said that half a million copies were sold in 
five years. In England the book had an almost equally re- 
markable run, and it was translated into most continental 
languages. 

As a reply to critics who doubted the truth of her portrayals 
the author published in 1853 A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin. 



350 American Literature 

The same year she went abroad^ and the inevitable volume of 
experiences appeared in 1854 as Sunny Memories of Foreign 

Lands, In 1856 she issued a second novel of 
lT W^ti^ slavery^ Dred, a Tale of the Great Dismal 

Swamp, based on some events in the Nat 
Turner slave insurrection of 1831. In later editions of her 
works this story appeared with the title Nina Oordori. At 
the time of its publication Mrs. Stowe went to England to 
protect her copyrights, and made a tour of the continent. 
After her return to America she continued to write profusely 
until she was seventy years of age. After that time her 
powers declined and she published nothing of importance. 
The Eiverside edition of her works comprises sixteen volumes. 
Among her later writings that deserve mention are two 
stories with New England background. The Minister's Woo- 
ing and Old-Town Folks. The former has a theological 
motive, less interesting now than when the book was written. 
The charm of both is due to the shrewd, S5rtnpathetic, and 
human portrayal of New England life — a life that the author 
knew far better than that which she depicts in Uncle Tom's 
Cabin. Some of her volumes are for young people and others 
are sketches with. a moral and didactic purpose. In 1869 
she contributed to the ^^Atlantic Monthly^^ a vindication of 
Lady Byron, which she followed by a book on the same sub- 
ject. It is based on revelations which she received, or be- 
lieved herself to have received, from Lady Byron herself. 
Her sincerity cannot be doubted, but her story was so revolt- 
ing that the world was not prepared to believe it without bet- 
ter authentication than she could offer, and the episode must 
be considered the most unfortunate in her literary career. 

Though many critics find the nearest approach to artistic 
excellence in the New England tales, Mrs. Stowe seems des- 
tined to be known as the author of one book. Uncle Tom's 
Cabin. The faults of this story are obvious. It is sensational. 



The Central Period 351 

and the plot structure is especially open to criticism. It is, 
however, a sympathetic presentation of life by an alert, 

kindly, and intensely human woman. After 
Mrs. Stowe s ^^^ analysis of such a book is likely to be less 

satisfactory than a statement of its success. 
At first its great sale in America was ascribed to its timeli- 
ness; but it had almost equal vogue in countries where 
the domestic institutions of America caused little concern, 
and after more than half a century it still maintains its popu- 
larity, and dramatized versions are still played not only in 
America but in England and on the Continent. Whatever 
the formal critic may say, such wide and long continued 
popularity shows the presence of some elements of literary 
greatness, if not of artistic skill. 

The author who has suddenly become a celebrity writes 
ever after at a disadvantage. After 1852 Mrs. Stowe worked 
with the public eye continually upon her. Personally she 
continued unspoiled by praise; but the quality of her work 
may have been injured by a knowledge of what was expected 
of her. At all events it is the critics rather than the common 
readers who have pointed out the excellences in her work of 
later date, while her first story has appealed to millions. 

Two lesser Connecticut authors were connected with events 
of the Civil War. H. H. Brownell (1820-1872), a Hartford 

lawyer, attracted the attention of Admiral 

Minor Farragut by some of his poems on naval sub- 

Connecticut . , n . T '11 1' 

Writers ]ects, and received an appointment as acting 

ensign that enabled him to see actual service. 
^The Bay Pighf ^ describes the battle of Mobile, at which he 
was present, and ^^The Eiver Pight'^ the engagement at New 
Orleans. Both seem imitative of greater poems on similar 
themes, such as Tennyson's ^The Eevenge/' and Cowper's 
^^On the Loss of the Eoyal George ;'' but both are tediously 
long and not well sustained. As the events of which they 



352 American Literature 

treat pass farther back into history the praise that they once 
received seems strangely overdone. Brownell's miscellaneous 
poems are equally unsuccessful. Theodore Winthrop (1828- 
1861) was descended from the early governor of Massachu- 
setts Bay, and on his mother's side from Jonathan Edwards. 
In the six years after his graduation from Yale in 1848 he 
visited various parts of Europe, Panama, California, and 
Oregon, and returned overland to the East. At the outbreak 
of the war he enlisted, rose to the rank of major, and was 
killed in battle in 1861. Before his death he had published 
little except some short papers in the ^^Atlantic Monthly.'^ 
His three novels, Cecil Dreeme, John Brent, and Edwin 
BrotJiertoft, two volumes of short sketches, and a collection 
of poems appeared posthumously and gained considerable 
vogue. The experiences of the author's short life gave him an 
abundance of material, and his stories and sketches of travel 
show great variety. It is probable, however, that public in- 
terest was stimulated somewhat by a knowledge of his per- 
sonality, and the picturesque facts of his career; and few 
persons now read his works. Eose Terry Cooke (1827-1892) 
published light and melodious verses, and short magazine 
stories. A touch of sentiment suggests the work of the earlier 
Connecticut school, though she is saved from offensive senti- 
mentality by a good sense of humor and by the change in the 
spirit of the times. 

In Ehode Island Albert G. Greene (1802-1868), a Provi- 
dence lawyer of literary tastes, wrote a number of poems, in- 
cluding two favorites of the old school readers, 
SandWrUws "^^^ Grimes'' and '^The Baron's Last Ban- 
quet." He also deserves to be remembered 
as the founder of the Harris Collection of American Poetry. 
Sarah Helen Whitman (1803-1878) was also a resident of 
Providence. Her maiden name was Power. In 1828 she 
was married to Mr. Whitman; in 1833 she was widowed. In 



1 

I 



The Central Period 353 

1848 she was provisionally engaged to Poe, but the arrange- 
ment was broken off^ partly through the agency of friends. 
Mrs. Whitman is best remembered on account of her rela- 
tions to Poe, and her essay ^^Edgar A. Poe and his Critics ;^^ 
but her poems are better than the average minor verse of the 
time. They have a tendency to be sentimental^ and are not 
highly original;, but they are remarkably melodious^ and 
show considerable familiarity with modern European litera- 
ture. Some of those which grew out of her relations Vith 
Poe are among her best and have an added biographic value. 
In Vermont Daniel P. Thompson (1795-1868)/ a farmer's 
boy who was educated at Middlebury college and became a 
prominent lawyer, J"iidge, politician, and edi- 

Minor Vermont ^^ wrote a number of historical and other 
writers ^ 

novels. Only one of these survives — The 

Green Mountain Boys, an historical romance dealing with 
Vermont in the Eevolution. The patriotic nature of the 
subject no doubt had much to do with the popularity of this 
tale; but the story is stirring and well told, and the book is 
still a good one for boys, and not beneath the notice of their 
elders. John G. Saxe (1816-1887) was also a native of Ver- 
mont, a graduate of Middlebury, a lawyer, an editor, and a 
politician. During his later years he resided in New York 
City and Albany. He is said to have been a brilliant but 
erratic man, with periods of nervous excitement which in 
later years became downright insanity. He began his literary 
career as [a newspaper humorist; and his best work is as the 
author of humorous poems, many of "^ which satirize social 
foibles. ^^The Proud Miss McBride,^^ one of the most popular 
of these, is aimed at the airs of the newly rich. It is clever, 
but like many of his poems is too long. Some of his other 
verses abound in puns, and have a slight burlesque element, 
suggesting Hood. His few serious poems are not of great 
value. Though not one of the greater American humorists. 



354 American Literature 

Saxe is well above the level of the ordinary newspaper rhym- 
ster, and his fun is genuine and clean. 

Celia Leighton Thaxter (1836-1894) was a native of Ports- 
mouth, New Hampshire, and passed most of her life on the 
Isle of Shoals, where her father was lighthouse 
Minor New keeper. Her prose sketches, Among the Isles 

'^j.-^gj. of Slioals, first published in the "Atlantic,^' 

and many of her poems show the influence of 
her life-long environment. Her prose is over-crowded with 
adjectives, but vivid, and full of suggestive description and 
anecdote. Her poems, many of them on subjects connected 
with the sea, have no great distinction, but rank well among 
the minor verse of the last quarter of the nineteenth century. 
In Maine Jacob Abbott (1803-1879), a Congregational 
clergyman, and for a time professor of mathematics and nat- 
ural philosophy in Amherst college, emulated 
wSrf ^^^ 'Teter Parley'^ as a writer of moral and in- 
structive books for the young. His biographer 
credits him with more than two hundred works. The most 
important are the twenty-eight volumes of the EoUo series, 
which tell of the life, adventures, and travels of EoUo Holiday 
and his family. Characters and events are both natural, 
but the story in each volume is slight, and the real aim is to 
give information. Jacob Abbott^s brother, John S. C. Abbott 
(1805-1877), also a clergyman, wrote a number of popular 
histories, some of them still read. He was a compiler rather 
than an original student. Mrs. Elizabeth Akers Allen (1832- 
) was born and passed the first thirty years of her life 
in Maine; later she lived in Washington, in Baltimore, and 
in New York. Her poems, some of them published over the 
signature of Florence Percy, are mostly lyrics. The only one 
now generally remembered is the sentimental ^^Eock me to 
Sleep, Mother,^^ which by no means represents her best work. 
A Maine writer of greater distinction was Sylvester Judd 



The Central Period 355 

(1813-1853)^ long pastor of a Unitarian church at Augusta. 
He was born in Massachusetts and was graduated from Yale 
college and from Harvard divinity school. 
•^ His most important work bears the rather 

appalling title of Margaret, a Tale of the Real and Ideal, 
Blight and Bloom; Including Sketches of a Place not before 
Described, called Mons Christi. It was first published in 
1845 and revised in 1851. The scene is laid in ISTew Eng- 
land in the years just following the Eevolution. The heroine, 
Margaret, is a waif who grows up among the lowest classes 
of New England society, in the midst of vice and without 
religious instruction, but remains pure, and has religious 
dreams and visions. After many experiences she marries a 
wonderful Mr. Evelyn, who converts her to Unitarianism, 
and together they purchase the country about her former 
home and establish an ideal state of society. The first part 
of the book was written after careful antiquarian research, 
and impresses the reader as true to life, even without the 
tributes to its fidelity from older New England critics. The 
later part shows the strangely confused ideals of a transcen- 
dental Unitarian. The book was devoutly written to interpret 
the author^s views more freely than he could express them in 
sermons. As a unified work of art it is nothing; but some 
scenes are strong, the interpretation of New England life 
and nature is excellent, and the ^^idea?^ parts are an interest- 
ing if sometimes an amusing revelation of certain aspects of 
New England thought. Judd also published Philo, an Evan- 
geliad, in verse, and a second tale, Richard Edney, which 
deals with contemporary New England life. His biographer 
gives copious extracts from a blank verse tragedy which was 
never published. These works have the defects of Margaret, 
with less of its power. 

New England produced several writers who became famous 
for a coarse grained and more hilarious humor than that of 



356 American Literature 

Lowell and Holmes. Chief among these was Charles Farrar 

Browne (1834-1867), who wrote over the name of Artemns 

Ward. He was born in Maine, and after re- 

ew ngan ceivine^ an elementary education worked first 
Humorists ^ -^ 

as printer and then as reporter on various 

papers in New England, New York and Ohio. He first at- 
tracted attention by humorous articles i'n a Cleveland news- 
paper about 1858. In 1861 he began to lecture, and was 
successful both in the East and in California, where he 
made an extended trip in 1862-4. In 1866 he went to 
England on a lecturing tour which opened auspiciously, 
but was soon ended by his death from consumption at the 
age of thirty- two. As a lecturer Artemus Ward is said to 
have possessed an imperturbable gravity of manner which 
added much to the effect of his drolleries. The humor in his 
writings comes from his extreme whimsicality and unexpected 
turns of thought and phrase. Many of his newspaper essays 
read better than the lectures. A few are slightly coarse, but 
the majority are wholly clean and wholesome. Among less 
important humorists was Seba Smith (1792-1868), also a 
native of Maine and a journalist. As Major Jack Downing he 
wrote humorous letters, largely on political topics. Benjamin 
P. Shillaber (1814-1890), a Boston editor, won fame as the 
creator of Mrs. Partington, a sort of Yankee Mrs. Malaprop. 
Besides the Mrs. Partington sayings, which depend for their 
humor on the misuse of words, he wrote many other sketches, 
several of them for juvenile readers. 

V. New York Writers 

While Boston was in one sense the literary capital of the 
country from 1833 to 1883, New York was the center of those 
commercial industries most closely allied with literature. 
New England developed one magazine of great literary sig- 
nificance, and one publishing house that controlled the copy- 



The Central Period 357 

rights of many of the best works of American authors; but 

New York was the center of the book trade and of general 

publishing interests^ it had the best daily pa- 

Condrtionsm ^^^^^ ^^^ ^^ came to lead in the publication 

of magazines. The ^^Knickerbocker Magazine'^ 
and ^Tutnam^s Monthly Magazine^^ were both solid and 
respectable periodicals^ though they never equalled the "At- 
lantic ;'^ and with the increased use of high grade illustrations 
in magazines "Harper's Monthly Magazine/' "Scribner's 
Monthly/' (afterward the "Century Magazine")^ and later 
the new "Scribner's Magazine" and others came to occupj^ a 
high place. The presence of these publishing interests could 
not fail to make New York the home of many writers, and 
the literary headquarters, so to speak, of many others. A 
large number of men were attracted from different sections 
of the country to editorial positions on New York newspapers 

and magazines. The list includes writers like 
Ed^t ^^ ^^ Dana and Eipley, who have been discussed 

among New England writers, and Poe, who 
more properly belongs to the South; and others, like Sted- 
man. Gilder, Aldrich, and Howells, who will be remembered 
chiefly as poets or novelists. A considerable number of men, 
however, who should be credited to New York deserve a place 
in literary history on account of work that was closely associ- 
ated with editorial labors. 

Nathaniel Parker Willis (1806-1867) was one of the most 
prominent of early New York editors and was a great figure 

in the literary life of his time. He was born 
N. P. Willis . . 

in Portland, Maine, of the strictest New Eng- 
land ancestry, and was educated at Andover and Yale. Even 
before he left college he had gained a wide reputation by his 
poems, especially some of his paraphrases of Scripture narra- 
tives. After his graduation he wrote poems, edited annuals 
for Goodrich, and founded in Boston the "American Monthly 



358 American Literature 

Magazine/' This failed, and in 1831 Willis, who was find- 
ing the strict tradition to which he was born irksome, removed 
to New York and became associated with George P. Morris 
in the editorship of the ^^New York Mirror.*^ AVith this 
paper and its successors, the "New Mirror'^ and the "Home 
Journal,^^ he maintained an uninterrupted connection until 
his death. From 1831 to 1836 he was abroad. He travelled 
widely in Europe, made his way into the best society, 
and turned what he saw to account in gossipy letters for pub- 
lication. He married an English lady and brought her home 
to a country place near Owego which he named Glenmary. 
Nine years later his wife died, and some time afterward he 
married again and settled in a less pretentious residence, 
Idlewild, on the Hudson. Both Glenmary and Idlewild 
figure in his writings. 

Willis avowed a frank preference for editorial work and 
journalistic correspondence that would please his contem- 
poraries, rather than for the preparation of 
^ ^ ^ elaborate productions in the hope of post- 
humous fame. With the exception of one novel, Paul Fane, 
almost all his prose was in the form of short letters, sketches, 
and tales, and was first published in some periodical. Several 
of his volumes, like Pencilling s by the Way, smdi Loiterings 
of Travel, are made up of travellers' letters. Others, like 
Letters from Under a Bridge, Out Doors at Idlewild, and 
The Convalescent, are gossipy correspondence from hif5 
country homes. Life Here and There, Hurrygraphs, Fun 
Jottings, The Rag-Bag, and others are more miscellaneous, 
and are made up of magazine ephemera. Two dramas, 
"Bianca Visconti'' and "Tortessa; or The Usurer Matched,'' 
and "Lady Jane/' a poem influenced by Don Juan, are, with 
the novel already mentioned, his most ambitious productions. 
The bulk of his poetical work was done in early life. 

As editor and elder man of letters Willis was the helpful 



The Central Period 359 

friend of many young American writers ; but the great popu- 
larity of his works^ and a certain jaunty air which he affected, 
made him enemies. In some respects he was 
Willis's Q ^^ criticism. He was a man of the 

world who without family or money made 
his way into some of the best society of Europe; and he was 
accused of turning into newspaper copy family and society 
secrets which a more delicately minded man would have re- 
frained from mentioning. It should be said, however, that 
this charge was brought by rival Americans, rather than by 
the European friends who were supposed to have suffered. 
He fought a duel with an English author, and he was named 
as co-respondent in the most famous divorce case that agi- 
tated New York society about the middle of the nineteenth 
century. In this, as in many of the matters charged against 
him, his guilt was not proved. He should probably be remem- 
bered as a kindly but rather weak man, whose shortcomings 
were due to a deficient sense of the highest fitness of things, 
rather than to any deliberate violation of the ethical and 
social code. 

As a poet Willis enjoyed great vogue and still finds a few 
readers. His paraphrases of Scripture seem flat and artificial, 

now that the simplicity and directness of the 
Willis's Poems Tt-i-i n • j t x 

Bible prose are so generally appreciated. In 

a time when the sacredness of the book precluded the thought 

of reading it as literature there was need of anything that 

would visualize Bible scenes and make Bible characters seem 

real men and women. To many devout readers ^^Hagar in 

the Wilderness'^ and ^^Jephthah's Daughter'^ were the highest 

type of poetry. Many of the miscellaneous verses show the 

sentimentality of the author's time ; some, like ^^Parrhasius,'' 

though powerful, are artificial. His satire, ^^Lady Jane," 

has deservedly shared the fate of other imitations of Don 

Juan. Perhaps the best of the poems are sentimental or 



360 American Literature 

humorous trifles which would at a little later time have been 
called society verse. 

As a prose writer Willis had a taking journalistic style. 
He knew what would interest the public ; and he was a master 
of the art of making his writing personal 
without seeming to be egotistical. He kept 
himself prominent in his letters from abroad; many of his 
sketches and tales are autobiographic. His letters from Glen- 
mary and Idlewild often dealt with the most trivial and com- 
monplace matters^ and drew their interest from the fact that 
the author, a distinguished man of letters, seemed to be 
chatting with the individual reader concerning his garden, 
his poultry, or his personal ailments. The chief defects of 
form are those that come from haste and a lack of feeling for 
the chastity of language. The titles of his books indicate a 
tendency to be striking; and the same tendency is shown 
in the coinage of barbarous words and the forming of strange 
compounds. 

Both as a man and as an author Willis was genial, and 

truly devoted to America and American literature; but both 

his personal and his literary ideals were lack- 
Willis's Rank . . . .,., J n TT :i-J 1 i? 

mg m virility and firmness. He did much for 
American authors and American letters, and later critics 
have been somewhat slow to appreciate his services. The 
oblivion which is overtaking his works is deserved, but not 
the slighting obloquy which is sometimes cast upon the author. 
Almost the opposite of Willis in most particulars was 
Horace Greeley (1811-1872), the founder of the ''N'ew York 

Tribune.'^ He was born in Amherst, New 
Horace Greeley tt i • i i • ± ci x i, 

Hampshire, where his parents were Scotch- 
Irish farmers of the lowest class. After receiving slight edu- 
cation and serving an apprenticeship in country newspaper 
offices he became a tramp printer and made his way to New 
York. Here, after a variety of experiences as printer, publisher, 



The Central Period 361 

and editor of campaign papers, he founded the ^^Tribune," 
which he controlled editorially until shortly before his death. 
In 1872 he seceded from the Eepublican party and became a 
candidate for president on the Liberal Eepublican and Demo- 
cratic tickets. The strain of the campaign, followed by the 
disappointment of an overwhelming defeat, broke down his 
healthy and he died a few days after the election. 

As a writer, Greeley was master of a rough and ready 
outspoken style that impressed his readers with his honesty 
and fearlessness. In both writings and actions he had a way 
of occasionally doing the unexpected thing. He was to some 
degree in sympathy with the New England transcendental 
movement, and he employed on the ^^Tribune'^ Margaret 
Fuller, George Eipley, George William Curtis, C. A. Dana, 
and other transcendentalists. He defended in the ^^Tribune'^ 
some of the doctrines of Fourier, and he gave much space 
to reports and discussions of table-tipping and other spiritual- 
istic phenomena, though he did not profess belief. It was 
through the ^^Tribune^' that the spirit of ^^the newness^^ which 
inspired New England found its way to many readers in 
other parts of the country. The paper also led public thought 
on political and economic questions. Greeley wrote a history 
of the civil war, which was naturally somewhat partizan; 
What I know of Farming, an amusing book telling of his 
unsuccessful agricultural experiences; and an interesting 
autobiography. Recollections of a Busy Life. He is remem- 
bered, however, not because of these works, but because of 
his influence through the ^^Tribune'' — an influence not easily 
realized now, when the race of great personal editors is ex- 
tinct, and not one reader in ten can name the man who con- 
trols the policy of his favorite newspaper. 

With New York editors may also be included the Eeverend 
Rufus Wilmot Griswold (1815-1857). He was a native of 
Vermont, and in early life had a varied career as printer, 



362 American Literature 

editor, and Baptist clergyman. From 1841 to 1843 he edited 

^^Graham^s Magazine^^ in Philadelphia, and then removed to 

New York, where he was connected with various 

us Wiimo minor periodicals. His own inconsiderable 
Gnswold ^ 

writings m prose and verse are now for- 
gotten, but he is remembered as the compiler and editor of 
several collections of American literature. His Poets and 
Poetry of America, Prose Writers of America, and Female 
Poets of America each went through several editions. In 
these works he bestowed praise on American authors with a 
lavishness that now seems ridiculous ; nevertheless he antago- 
nized many persons who did not receive what they felt to 
be their due share of compliments. A much better man would 
have made the same enemies ; and much was charged against 
him that was untrue. Still, after all possible allowances are 
made, he seems to have been conceited, and not always impar- 
tial, and, what is worse, to have lacked a high sense of honor. 
His edition of Poe will be considered in another place. His 
collections and criticisms did considerable service in calling 
attention to the body of readable American writings; but it 
is a distinct misfortune that this labor could not have been 
performed by an abler and a juster man. 

Of less importance than the men already mentioned was 
Park Benjamin (1809-1864), son of a Connecticut man who 

had removed to British Guiana. He was con- 
E^t^^ ^^ ^^ nected editorially with a number of papers 

and magazines, among them the ^^American 
Monthly Magazine,^^ and "Brother Jonathan,^^ and he wrote 
many verses and miscellaneous essays. Lewis Gaylord Clark 
(1810-1873), for many years editor of the "Knickerbocker 
Magazine,^^ was a native of western New York. He was 
known in his day as a writer of clever and genial quips and 
sketches, which usually appeared in the editorial departments 
of his magazine and a few of which were collected in book 



The Central Period 363 

form. T. S. Fay (1807-1898), a native of New York city, 
was for a time associated with Morris and Willis on the 
^'New York Mirror/^ and published a novel, Norman Leslie, 
and several volumes of miscellaneous essays. 

George William Curtis (1824-1892) represented the New 
York of a slightly later date than the men who have already 

been mentioned. He was born in Providence, 
VmS ^'"'^"^ Rhode Island, but his family removed to New 

York in 1839. He served for a year as clerk 
in a mercantile house, and gained the familiarity with New 
York business life that he showed later in Prue and I, 
Trumps, and other writings. In 1842 he and his brother 
became pupils in the school at Brook Farm, and later he 
spent some time with the families of two farmers near Con- 
cord. In these days he was a young man of fascinating per- 
sonality, devoted to music, and so strongly affected by tran- 
scendentalism that he adopted various fads in dress and diet. 
At Concord he was a member of the little transcendental 
circle that gathered about Emerson, though he was not blind 
to the humorous aspects of the movement. From 1846 to 
1850 he was abroad, journeying in a leisurely manner 
through Europe and spending some time in Egypt and Syria. 
The chief literary results of this trip were Nile Notes of a 
Howadji, and The Hoivadji in Syria, published in 1851 and 
1852 respectively. These differ from ordinary books of 
travel in that they attempt to give the spirit of the scene 
rather than minute descriptive details; and they surprised 
some of the author^s friends by showing a frank yielding to the 
sensuous charm of the East. Though the descriptions are too 
full of adjectives and too intense, the volumes still have 
power to delight the sympathetic reader and almost to carry 
him into a land of enchantment. 

On his return to America Curtis began his long career 
as an editor. He was at first connected with the "New 



364 American Literature 

York Tribune/' but soon became editor of "Putnam's" and 
began to conduct the Easy Chair department in "Harper's 
Monthly." In 1857 he also became chief editorial writer for 
"Harper's Weekly." He achieved much fame as an orator 
and went on the lyceum platform. Though he persistently 
declined public office he was always active in politics, and in 
his later years was perhaps the most prominent leader in the 
movement for civil service reform. 

After the publication of his first two volumes Curtis's 
chief literary work was done for the periodicals which he 
edited and for the lecture platform. Lotus- 
Writings Bating is a series of letters from American 

watering places, full of comparisons with the 
European scenes that were still fresh in his mind, and of 
satire on American social crudeness. The Potiphar Papers, 
Prue and I, and his one novel. Trumps, are the work of a 
man who has read Thackeray and who takes something of the 
same view of the world, but is much more downright in 
thought and expression. All satirize the selfishness and 
sordidness of ISTew York life. Prue and I, the most delicate 
of the three, still has its admirers, but in all the satire is too 
serious to be really pleasing. By far the most charming 
volumes that bear the author's name are those which contain 
essays selected from the "Easy Chair." Next in interest are 
a collection of Orations and Addresses and another of Literary 
and Social Essays, issued after his death. 

George William Curtis's great power was due to his geni- 
ality, to the absolute purity and disinterestedness of his na- 
ture, and to his genuine devotion to democratic 
Curtis's ^ ideals. He offered the too rare spectacle of 

an American in politics without desire of per- 
sonal reward. In the midst of New York life he always kept 
some of the characteristics of transcendental New England — 
a touch of sentiment, high idealism, and an intense devotion 



The Central Period 365 

to duty. His essays in the ^^Easy Chair'' often announced views 
on moral questions with which many of his readers must have 
disagreed^ but no one who had felt the charm of the author 
could take offense. On the whole^ he was at his best in 
descriptive and reminiscent sketches where his kindliness and 
human sympathy predominate, and in his simple comments 
on life where his reiteration of old but needed truths never 
seems trite. 

Another influential journalist of the latter half of the 
period was Edwin Lawrence Godkin (1831-1902), a native 

of Ireland, who came to America in 1856. 
E^* ^^^ After engaging in miscellaneous journalistic 

work and studying law he founded in 1865 
the New York ^^Nation/' with which he was connected until 
his death. He was master of a vigorous style of editorial 
writing which was effective, but likely to be irritating to those 
who disagreed with him. Though he published some works 
in book form, the achievement for which he deserves to be 
remembered is the establishment of the ^^N^ation'' in the high 
position which it has long held among American weeklies. 
Parke Godwin (1816-1904), a native of New Jersey and a 
graduate of Princeton, was long associated with his father-in- 
law, William CuUen Bryant, on the ^^Evening Post.'' He 
also edited other periodicals, among them the "Harbinger," 
the organ of Fourierism in New York, and "Putnam's 
Monthly." The first essay in his volume Out of the Past 
is a review of Bryant's poems, written in 1839, and his last 
volume was A New Study of Shakespeare's Sonnets, 1900. 
During all the intervening years he took an active interest 
in matters pertaining to art and literature, and was a figure 
of some literary importance, though few of his works have 
a lasting literary quality. Mary Mapes Dodge (1838-1905), 
a native of New York, was for over thirty years editor of 
"St. Nicholas," and achieved a national reputation as the 



366 American Literature 

author of stories and verses for children. Her most popular 
story is ^^Hans Brinker^ or the Silver Skates/^ the scene of 
which is laid in Holland. She had a sense of humor, and 
the art of writing stories that children enjoy, rather than 
those which adults think they ought to enjoy. Eichard Grant 
White (1821-1885) passed his entire life in New York city, 
and was connected with several newspapers. He published 
two editions of Shakespeare^s works, much Shakespearian 
criticism, and some popular treatises on modern linguistics. 
He was also the author of an anonymous political satire, 
The New Gospel of Peace according to Saint Benjamin, a 
novel, and other works. White maintained some peculiar 
views regarding the English language, and his manner in his 
writings was of a nature to attract attention, but not to 
strengthen his authority. He was a pronounced Anglo- 
maniac, and he always gave the impression of feeling con- 
tempt for anyone who questioned his dogmatic critical dicta. 
He was really a student of industry and considerable insight, 
and though not a great scholar, made some valuable contri- 
butions to the mass of Shakespearian criticism. 

Aside from the editors already mentioned and the poets 
who were also remembered for their prose, New York pro- 
duced few important essayists. The influence 
Es^^sTs-- of Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) was 

Henry Ward largely due to his published writings, though 
Beecher ^^ might from his twenty years^ connection 

with the New York ^^Independent'^ be classed among the edi- 
tors, and to his contemporaries he was first of all an orator. 
He was born in Connecticut, a son of the Eeverend Lyman 
Beecher and a brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe. After 
graduating from Amherst college and entering the ministry 
he preached for a time in Indiana. In 1847 he was called 
to Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, and held the pastorate until 
his death. Here he soon became recognized as the most 



The Central Period 367 

influential pulpit orator in America, and his sermons,. pub- 
lished week by week from stenographic reports, reached 
thousands of persons who never heard him preach. He be- 
lieved in carrying into the pulpit the discussion of ethical 
and sociological matters and in going out upon the platform 
to discuss political and social questions. He was a leader in 
the anti-slavery movement, and during the war he visited 
England and did much to turn public sentiment, which had 
been largely with the South. His addresses in some of the 
manufacturing towns are probably unexcelled in modern 
times as examples of the art of managing a hostile audience. 
He was a man of great energy and wide interests. With him 
religion was a matter of action rather than of belief; and 
his theological views, always liberal, became so modified that 
Plymouth Church finally withdrew from the fellowship of 
Congregational churches. In 1874 his name was involved 
in a scandal which was discussed throughout the country. 
Public opinion, like the jury before which the case was tried, 
disagreed, but the prevailing view was in favor of his inno- 
cence. His church was loyal to him, but his influence in the 
country at large suffered somewhat. He did some editorial 
work while he was preaching in the West, and later on the 
New York ^^Independent.^^ His published works were numer- 
ous, and include a novel, Norwood; or Village Life in New 
England, and essays on many subjects; the best, however, 
are the reports of his spoken discourses. 

Directness, practicality, humor, and insight are the char- 
acteristics of Beecher^s best works. He was never afraid to 

express his thoughts and he had the knack of 
Beecher's Rank . .,,. , n- . t, . . 

hittmg upon telling phrases, it was mevi- 

table that work done as his was should be uneven, and after 

he became famous it was hard for him to avoid publishing 

the poor as well as the good. His geniality sometimes led 

him, also, to attempt work for which he was not fitted. It 



368 American Literature 

was at the solicitation of his friend, Eobert Bonner, of the 
New York ^^Ledger/^ that he wrote Norwood; neither his 
previous experiences nor his habits of mind were likely to 
make him successful in novel-writing. The bulk of Ms 
mediocre work has tended to obscure his real merit, but he 
holds an unquestioned place among the few great American 
orators, and he should also be remembered as an essayist of 
much power. 

Henry T. Tuckerman (1813-1871), a native of Boston 
who after 1845 lived in New York, was an essayist of con- 
siderable contemporary reputation. In early 

Minor New York j^anhood he spent some time in Italy, and 
Essayists ^ •^ ^ 

produced the inevitable books of travel. Later 

he wrote verses and many essays on literature and art. The 

most readable of the latter are rambling and slow-moving — 

at times slightly suggestive of Irving — the evident work of a 

man who has gained much from books and travel. His more 

formal works, like Thoughts on the Poets, are more solid, but 

lack charm. 

Among the New York writers of prose fiction the name of 

Mr. William Dean Howells would stand first if it were not 

for the fortunate fact that he is still actively 
New York writing, and hence does not come within 

Fiction^ ^ the scope of this history. In the earlier 

years of the period New York failed to 
maintain the reputation of the preceding generation. 
Not until the later magazine writers were there produced 
short stories that could compare with those of Irving. And 
although some of the authors named below wrote stories of 
adventure no one deserves to be classed with Cooper or above 
Paulding in this field. 

Herman Melville (1819-1891) wrote tales of adventure, 
both authentic and fictitious. He was the descendant of an 
old New England family, but his parents removed to New 



The Central Period 369 

York before his birth. He early developed a taste for adven- 
ture, which was perhaps strengthened by reading Dana's 

Two Years before the Mast. Before he was 
Herman twenty he had made a voyage to Liverpool; 

and in 1841 he joined a whaling crew bound 
for the Pacific by way of Cape Horn. Before he returned to 
America in 1845 he deserted the ship, lived for some time 
with a cannibal tribe on one of the South Sea Islands, es- 
caped in an Australian whaler, was concerned in an incipient 
mutiny, had various shore experiences on Tahiti, and came 
home in an American man-of-war. His first book was Typee, 
published in 1846, in which he tells of his experiences 
among the cannibal tribe. Omoo continues his story, and 
tells of life on the Australian whaler and on Tahiti. These 
two works are not fiction, but sections of autobiography, told 
from recollection. Both are simple, straight-forward narra- 
tives, and though wholly without plot-interest are fascinating. 
Redburn is a novel based on his early voyage to Liverpool. 
White-Jachet continues the Typee and Omoo series, and tells 
of his return voyage on a man-of-war. Moby Dick, or the 
White Whale, is a story of a crazed sea captain who pursued 
around the world the invincible white whale that had maimed 
him for life. Many incidents are told with a detail that sug- 
gests that they were actual experiences of the author's own 
whaling voyage. The conception of the story is a powerful 
one, but it is not adequately sustained. By this time (1850) 
the author had become deeply interested in abstruse phi- 
losophy, and especially, it is said, in Sir Thomas Browne. 
As a result his style suffered a complete and disastrous change 
from the directness of Typee and Omoo, The beginnings of 
this change are seen in Moby Dick; and it is more marked in 
the author's later prose works, which are hardly readable. 
Battle Pieces and Aspects of the War is a collection of poems, 
mostly crude and formless, but written with much enthusiasm. 



370 American Literature 

Melville's early work is so good as to cause serious regret at 
the deterioration of his style. 

The Eeverend Edward Payson Eoe (1838-1888), a novel- 
ist of a different sort^ must be mentioned because his works 

afford an index of popular taste. His literary 

career began in 1872 with the publication of 
Barriers Burned Away, a story of the great Chicago fire. 
The success of this was so great that the author resigned his 
pastorate at Highland Falls^ near the Hudson, and devoted 
himself to writing. From this time until his death he pub- 
lished an average of more than a volume a year, all fiction 
except two or three books on horticulture. Among his novels 
were The Opening of a Chestnut Burr, 'Near to Nature's 
Heart, and Nature's Serial Story. All these were very popu- 
lar, and at the time of his death his publishers estimated 
that nearly 1,400,000 copies of his books had been sold. 
Eoe took his writing seriously, visiting factories, jails, and 
courtrooms for literary material, and he always wrote with a 
moral purpose. His great success is due in part to the fact 
that he made use of mildly sensational plots to inculcate 
moral lessons. His stories are always wholesome and they are 
sometimes told with power. In both structure and style 
they are, however, crude and slovenly. Their unequalled 
popularity shows high moral standards rather than cultivated 
literary taste on the part of middle class American readers. 
Fitz James O^Brien (1828P-1862) wrote poems, essays, and 
dramas, but is best remembered for a few of his short stories. 

He was born in Limerick, Ireland, and edu- 
O'BrieT^^ cated at the University of Dublin, and is 

reputed to have run through with a fortune 
of £8,000 before he came to New York at the age of twenty- 
four. Here he became a member of the "Bohemian^^ set, and 
in the ten years before his death did a great amount of writ- 
ing for newspapers and magazines. At the opening of the 



The Central Period 371 

Civil War he enlisted in the IJnion army^ and his death was 
the result of wounds. Some of the best of his work has been 
collected and edited by his friend^ William Winter. O^Brien 
was a genius of remarkable power and originality. His ir- 
regular life and his habits of hasty writing interfered with 
the production of finished work, and render hazardous any 
conjecture as to what he might have accomplished if he had 
not been killed at the early age of thirty-four. It was a 
hopeful sign, however, that his three best short stories, ^^The 
Diamond Lens,'' ''The Wondersmith,'' and ''What Was It? a 
Mystery,'' were written in his later years. These three tales 
are by no means perfect in structure, but they show a mar- 
vellous originality of imagination. The unique conception 
of a being invisible, but palpable to the other senses, which 
he develops in "What Was It? a Mystery," has since been 
borrowed by de Maupassant and other artists who deal with 
the supernatural. 

Among the lesser writers of adventure in the early part of 
the period was Mrs. Caroline M. Kirkland (1801-1864). 

After her marriage she lived for a time in 
Minor New York Michigan, and her experiences on what was 
Fiction ^^^^ ^^^ frontier furnished the inspiration 

for her earliest and best writings, A New 
Home: Who'll Follow? Forest Life, and Western Clearings. 
These tales and sketches, published under the assumed name 
of Mrs. Mary Clavers, give shrewd, humorous, observant 
pictures of pioneer life, and lack the exaggeration common 
in western sketches. Several miscellaneous works published 
after Mrs. Kirkland's return to New York are unimportant. 
The literary achievements of Cornelius Mathews (1817- 
1889) were so varied that he is hard to classify, but he 
may well be placed among the writers of fiction. He was 
a New York lawyer, but gave most of his time to litera- 
ture. His stories The Career of Puffer Hopkins, and 



373 American Literature 

Big Ahel and the Little Manhattan, satirize conditions in 
New York city. Mathews took great interest in the Indians. 
He published Behemoth, a Legend of the Mound-Builders, 
WaJcendah, an Indian poem^, and a collection of Indian 
legends adapted from Schoolcraft. Among his other writ- 
ings are dramas and poems. He had versatility, imagination, 
and some humor, but was lacking in finish. Hjalmar Iljorth 
Boyesen (1848-1895) was born in Norway and educated at 
Leipsic and at the University of his native country. He came 
to America in 1869, and after editing a Norwegian weekly 
in Chicago and teaching the classics in a western college 
he became professor of German at Cornell, and afterward at 
Columbia. Boyesen^s masters in fiction were Tolstoi and 
Turgenieff among Europeans, and Mr. Howells among 
Americans, and the latter frankly admits that his pupil ^^out- 
realisted'^ him. Boyesen's work has individuality and is 
pleasingly suggestive of his foreign birth and training. He 
is at his best in stories that deal with Norwegian life. Some 
of his tales for boys are especially good. 

In humorists New York was less prolific than were other 

sections of the country. Eobert H. Newell (1836-1901) wrote 

between 1861 and 1868 a series of political 

Humodsfs ^^*^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^ ''Orpheus C. Kerr.'' 

Nothing in the papers is better than the pun 
in this signature. Mrs. Frances M. Whitcher (1811-1852), 
who passed her life in central New York state, was the author 
of The Widow Bedott Papers, and some other humorous 
sketches in prose. The Widow Bedott is funny chiefly because 
of her garrulity, and her proclivity for endless digressions in 
her narratives. 

Of the many New York writers who essayed verse, only one, 
Whitman, is commonly named among the greater American 
poets. With Whitman were grouped, in the late fifties and 
early sixties, a small circle nicknamed the Bohemians, whose 



The Central Period 373 

rendezvous was Pfafl's restaurant on — or more accurately 
under — Broadway^, near Bleecker street. Many fables are 
told of this coterie^ which seems to have 
Literary Groups j^g^^^ made up of erratic and often impecunious 
and "Schools" ^ ^ xx i t x 

in New York newspaper men and unattached writers. 

With the exceptions of Whitman, Fitz James 
O'Brien, and William Winter most of them are now wholly 
forgotten. The names of several other New York writers 
who may have been rare visitors at Pfaffs are sometimes 
erroneously added to the list. The Bohemians are an inter- 
esting literary tradition in New York, but they are more pic- 
turesque than significant, and even their picturesqueness has 
very likely increased with time. The only group of poets 
which could in any sense be called a New York ^^schooF^ was 
composed of Bayard Taylor, Edmund Clarence Stedman, 
Eichard Henry Stoddard, and Thomas Bailey Aldrich. Of 
this group Taylor should more properly be considered with 
the Pennsylvania writers. 

Eichard Henry Stoddard (1825-1903) was born in Hing- 
ham, Massachusetts. His father, a sailor, was lost at sea 

when he was but a few years old. His mother 

Stodd^ d ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^* ^^ P^^^ financial circumstances, 
which were not improved after her second 
marriage. In 1835 the family went to New York. Here 
young Stoddard gained a little schooling, but at the age of 
fifteen he was set to work. He tried all sorts of occupations 
— errand-boy, shop-boy, copyist in a lawyer's ofiice, black- 
smith, molder in an iron foundry, and assistant to a carriage 
painter. Meanwhile he was reading such poetry as he could 
lay his hands on, and writing verses for his own amusement. 
In 1849 he issued his first volume of poems, which he after- 
ward suppressed. In 1852 he was married to Miss Elizabeth 
Barstow, who also attained some reputation as a writer of 
verse. By this time he had formed an acquaintance with 



374 - American Literature 

many men of letters^ and through the influence of some of 
them, especially Hawthorne and Whipple, he secured a clerk- 
ship in the New York custom house. This position he held 
from 1853 to 1870. The next three years he was a clerk in 
the dock commissioner's office, and for a short time he was 
city librarian. During his last ten years in the custom house 
he was literary editor of the New York ^^World/' and from 
1880 until his death he filled the same position on the ^^Mail 
and Express.'^ He edited and compiled several books, revised 
Griswold's Poets of America, and published several volumes 
of his own poems, and a collection of essays entitled Under 
the Evening Lamp, His Recollections, which he was pre- 
paring for the press at the time of his death, appeared post- 
humously. 

It is pleasant to notice that Stoddard's friends and many 
of his acquaintances speak in the warmest terms of his per- 
sonality. His prose writings give the impres- 
Stoddard's Prose • p ^ , - ±^ > i 

sion 01 a man who was too conscious that he 

had risen by his own exertions, and who was a little inclined 
to patronize others. He speaks slightingly of his mother, 
who seems really to have done for him all that her means 
and her strength allowed. His criticisms are likely to be 
generalities, or to be warped by apparent prejudice. In his 
early years Poe declined, in a way that offended him, to pub- 
lish one of his poems, and he was always fond of repeating 
the most unfavorable stories regarding Poe, and of character- 
izing his poems with such penetrating remarks as "The 
parent of Annabel Lee was Mother Goose.^^ All in all, his 
critical work is of little value, as regards either content or 
style. 

It is Stoddard^s poetry that constitutes his best claim to 
remembrance. He was of those who care for beauty of form 
and concept rather than for didacticism; and he had a fine 
sense of melody. His friends and special admirers are in the 



The Central Period 375 

habit of praising his blank verse and his odes^ but it seems 
probable that his lyrics will be more likely to last. Some of 

the briefest of these, like '^Birds/' '^The 
Po'itJ^'''^'^ Flight of Youth/' have a finish and a finality 

that should insure them a permanent place in 
any collection of American verse. The longer poems, even 
those in lyric measures, are likely to be uneven, and in places 
too obviously imitative. 

Edmund Clarence Stedman (1833-1908) was born at Hart- 
ford, Connecticut, the descendant of an old New England 

family. His father died when he was but two 
Edmund years old, and his mother, who was herself a 

Stedman writer of poetry, relinquished him to his 

father's relatives and married again. Hb 
entered Yale, where he attracted some attention by his verses, 
but was rusticated, and then dismissed for general wildness 
and dissipation. Many years later he made application for 
his degree and it was granted. After his dismissal from Yale 
he went South, edited country papers in New England, en- 
gaged in the clock business, and was married without his 
guardian's consent at the age of twenty. In 1855 he became 
a real estate and general broker in New York. Here he lived 
in a ^^Unitary Home," one of the cooperative experiments 
organized by readers of Fourier, and a number of his asso- 
ciates were writers and newspaper men. His poem, ^^The 
Diamond Wedding," a satire on a much heralded society 
event, was published in the ^^Tribune" in 1859, and attracted 
attention which was intensified when the father of the 
bride demanded ^^satisfaction" from the young author. A 
little later he contributed to the ^Tribune" ^^How Old John 
Brown Took Harper's Ferry," and ^^The Ballad of Lager 
Bier" — one a patriotic and the other a humorous lyric. The 
popularity of these three effusions led to an engagement on 
the ^^Tribune," which he soon left for the ^^World." He was 



376 American Literature 

war correspondent after the attack on Fort Sumter, and for 
a time held a government clerkship at Washington. In 1863 
he came back to New York, and entered Wall Street, becoming 
a member of the Stock Exchange a few years later. From 
this time until 1900 his life was a series of financial ups and 
downs, with much anxiety and never more than moderate 
success. In 1900 he sold his seat on the Stock Exchange and 
retired on a rather meager competency to devote himself 
wholly to literary work. 

Stedman always maintained that his chief interests were 
literary, and that he endured business only for the purpose 

of winning an opportunity for writing. Not- 
e mans withstanding the exactions of his feverish life 

in the Stock Exchange and almost constant 
ill health, he managed to do a considerable* amount of work as 
editor, as critic, and as poet. He compiled A. Victorian An- 
thology and An American Anthology, and, at an earlier date, 
collaborated with Ellen M. Hutchinson in A Library of 
American Literature, He also edited with George E. Wood- 
berry the works of Poe. His important criticism is contained 
in three volumes, Victorian Poets, Poets of America, and 
The Nature and Elements of Poetry — the last a series of 
lectures originally delivered at Johns Hopkins University. 
He also gave much study to the Sicilian idyllists, but never 
brought his work into shape for publication. His poems were 
written at various times throughout his life. 

Stedman^s letters show him to have been painstaking in 
matters of scholarly detail, and most of his editing is well 

done; though students of the Poe for which 

Ed*t°^^ d C 'f ^^ ^^^ ^^ P^^^ responsible are sometimes an- 
noyed by errors in collation, and strange de- 
cisions in choice of texts. His critical writings deal mostly 
with poetry. At an early age he arrived at the conclusion 
that "Beauty is governed by laws as severe and disco vera- 



The Central Period S1:7 

ble as are mathematics/^ and "The great poet — the great 
artist — is a nniversalist/ an eclectic/^ These views he 
never seriously modified^ and he developed them in his 
last and most serious critical volume^ The Nature and Ele- 
ments of Poetry, All his critical essays are careful work, 
based on "reading up" both in the poets themselves and in 
the writings of other critics — a type of production which every 
college instructor knows well, and which he should surely 
honor when it is well done. They are, however, lacking in the 
fl ashes of insight that characterize the work of the great 
critics, and they have little of the personal quality of LowelFs 
essays. The author sometimes shows erratic appreciations, 
as when he ranks Lord^s turgid lines "On the Defeat of a 
Great Man" with Whittier's "Ichabod." Often the breadth 
of his reading in preparation for a paper leads him to give 
oddly incongruous lists, as: "Bascom and Euskin follow 
Mill"; "Browning, Banville, Whitman, Emerson." N'otwith- 
standing these peculiarities his critical writings are solid, and 
not to be ignored by any student of the subjects which he 
treats. His Poets of America has no real rival in its field. 
Stedman's earliest verses in the "Tribune" were only tak- 
ing work of good newspaper grade, though the careful reader 

detects in them hints of such later and more 
Poe^^ ^^ finished poems as "Pan in Wall Street." In 

his more serious attempts of this time Ten- 
nyson was the chief influence, but he succeeded fairly well in 
being faithful to his belief that the true artist is an eclectic. 
His longer poems, like "The Blameless Prince," have their ex- 
cellences but they were never widely popular, and will be less 
and less read. In his later years he was a successful writer of 
occasional poems— perhaps the most successful after Holmes. 
He was at his best, however, in a variety of shorter poems 
scattered throughout his works — in one or two short patri- 
otic pieces like "Wanted — A Man," in New England idyls 



378 American Literature 

like ^^The Doorstep^^ and ^^Country Sleighing/^ in a trifle like 
"Toujours Amour/^ and in his almost unique impassioned 
song beginning, ^^Thou art mine, thou hast given thy word/^ 
All those named were, as it happens, written before he had 
passed middle age. But as the stress and disappointment 
of life grew upon him, he still wrote hopefully and with no 
less of excellence in form, yet with a calm recognition of the 
deeper meaning of things. 

It is a question whether Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836- 
1907) should not have been discussed among the New Eng- 
land writers. He was a native of New Eng- 
Sdrkh ^^'^^^ land, he spent a great part of his literary 
life in Boston, and he felt most at home there. 
Still, he began to write in New York, and so far as essential 
characteristics are concerned his poetry had more in common 
with that of Stoddard and Taylor than with that of his 
Boston and Cambridge literary friends. Though the least 
^^Bohemian'^ of the group in temperament he was at one 
time associated in a literary way with some of the frequenters 
of Pfaff^s restaurant. 

Aldrich was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, but 
spent part of his boyhood in New York and three years in 
New Orleans. His life after his return to Portsmouth is 
pictured with reasonable fidelity in The Story of a Bad Boy, 
For financial reasons he did not go to Harvard as he had 
planned, but at the age of sixteen entered his uncle's business 
office in New York. Here he began to publish verses and 
at the age of nineteen brought out a volume of poems. The 
same year, 1855, he wrote ^^Baby Beiy his first work to at- 
tract general attention. About this time he gave up busi- 
ness, and later held various editorial positions on New York 
papers. Before he was twenty-three he had published two 
volumes of verse and one of prose, and had made friends 
with Willis, Taylor, Stoddard, and other New York literary 



The Central Period 379 

men. For a time he was connected with the ^^Saturday 
Press/^ a lively satirical journal founded by Clapp^ the 
^^King of Bohemia/^ with the assistance of two other Bo- 
hemians^ O^Brien and Winter. At the outbreak of the war 
he asked for a military appointment, but missed it through 
an accident. For a few weeks he was war correspondent for 
the New York "Tribune.^^ By 1865 he had made himself 
well known as a writer of prose fiction and of verse, and was 
called to Boston to edit ^"^Every Saturday/^ a literary paper 
published by Fields and Osgood. From this time until his 
death Boston was his literary home, and his actual residence 
was in the city or not far away. From 1881 to 1890 he edited 
the ^^Atlantic.^^ After the latter date he travelled much, spend- 
ing several summers in Europe and twice going around the 
world. 

Aldrich was a fairly prolific writer, but he was an unspar- 
ing critic of himself and he chose carefully the work which 
he wished to be preserved. He retained not a single poem 
from his first collection of fifty, and rejected many of later 
date. His prose works were subjected to the same careful 
sifting. The residue is contained in seven volumes of prose 
and two of verse. 

Aldrich^s novels. Prudence Palfrey, The Stillwater 
Tragedy, and others, are well told, but they lack the vitality 
of his best work. His one long narrative 
which is sure to live is The Story of a Bad 
Boy, The slight change of Portsmouth to Eivermouth and 
the name of the hero, Tom Bailey, suggest how largely the 
story is autobiographical. It is the work of a man who re- 
tained full sympathy with his own boyhood and with other 
boys after he had lived long enough to learn what life really 
means. His insight into boyish ways suggests Mark Twain 
in Tom Sawyer and HucMeherry Finn, but his attitude is 
more sympathetic and his tone is quieter. Every reader who 



380 American Literature 

was fortunate enough to know the book in his boyhood will 
still recall passages, humorous and pathetic, which have 
fixed themselves in his memory. Among these is sure to be 
the few lines of restrained narrative which tell of the drifting 
away of Binny Wallace. A comparison of this impressively 
simple account with the treatment of tragic and pathetic 
events in other boys' stories will reveal much of the author's 
nature and the secret of his power. Next to The Story of 
A Bad Boy, Aldrich's best prose is in his short stories. He 
was a careful student of prose style and of the art of nar- 
ration, and he has left some of the most carefully planned 
and delicately wrought stories of the later nineteenth century. 
^^Marjory Daw/' usually conceded to be his masterpiece in 
short fiction, is one of the two best hoax stories by Ameri- 
can authors. That it is, however, more than ;a hoax is shown 
by the fact that it may be re-read with little loss of interest. 
Several other stories have a similar unexpected ending, but he 
confined himself to no one type of plot. His sketches of 
travel and the miscellanies in the Ponkapog Papers show, 
like everything else that he did, the charm of his manner, 
but are relatively unimportant. 

After compiling for the complete edition of his works all 
his poems which he wished preserved, Aldrich made, in the 

year before his death, a still briefer collection 
Aldrich's Poems . ^ -, a , i-ii - 1 ±1 

01 Songs and Sonnets which he evidently 

felt embodied the best of his verse. This judgment was 

undoubtedly correct. Much might be said in praise of his 

longer poems like ^^Wyndham Towers" and "Judith and Holo- 

fernes," but his most distinctive and most remarkable work 

is in the shorter poems which he called "Interludes." The 

lightest of these are mere society verse, but many of them, 

while equally exquisite in form, touch grave themes with an 

insight and a finality of expression that place them with the 

truest poetry. There are many of these poems, and no one 



The Central Period 381 

will serve as an adequate example^ for each has its individual 
quality. 

In all his writings, both prose and verse, Aldrieh was an 
artist, forever striving for perfection of form. He not only 

rejected his unsuccessful work, but he revised 
Artis^^ ^^^^ which he retained with a frequent and 

minute care that suggests the similar labors 
of Tennyson. He had a fine feeling for the purity of the 
English tongue, and he was shocked and pained by the 
vagaries of some of his later contemporaries. Yet, as he pro- 
tests in one of his poems, art for art's sake did not mean to 
him technique for technique's sake. Though he was not a 
propagandist or a preacher he had the IsTew England con- 
science, and the New England sense of the deeper things of 
life; and his work, though never obviously didactic, always 
rests on a sound and worthy philosophy of things. 

Aldrich's reputation as a wit and as a kindly gentleman 
still makes it difficult to judge his permanent rank. The 

Story of a Bad Boy and some of his best short 

stories ought to last. Of his poems, ^^Baby 
BelV one of his less distinctive pieces, is still popular after 
over half a century. It is no doubt a misfortune that his 
best work is in sonnets or still slighter poems which lack the 
bulk necessary to make an impression. Such pieces are likely 
to become mere fugitives, and to be denied credit for the 
excellence which they really possess. Still, it seems to many 
of Aldrich's admirers that, whether his popular reputation 
endures or not, he missed by only the slightest of margins a 
place with the greater American men of letters. 

Taylor, Stoddard, Stedman, and Aldrieh constitute the 
second most important group of American authors in the last 
half of the nineteenth century. In both external circum- 
stances and literary ideals they offer many points of contrast 
to the New England poets. They were not born in New York, 



383 American Literature 

but came, one from Pennsylvania, and the others from New 

England. Two of them, Taylor and Aldrich, lived in New 

York but a limited time. They were not 

The New go fortunate as to cluster about a erreat collefi^e 

York "School" ri tt a u 4- x r^ 

of Poets ^^^^ Harvard, or about a great literary 

magazine like the ^^Atlantic.^^ During their 
formative years such literary connections as they had were 
largely with newspapers and ephemeral literary magazines. 
Unfortunately for their fame they lacked a set of admiring 
friends like those survivors of the golden days in New Eng- 
land who have written so many interesting volumes of recol- 
lections and literary reminiscences. They met each other as 
friends, but privately and informally, and no Boswell has left 
a very definite record of what they said and did. We know, 
however, that they agreed — and this is their chief significance 
as a "schooP^ — in viewing poetry not primarily as an instru- 
ment for moral edification, but as an art. It would be mis- 
leading to push the comparison far, but in some ways they were 
related to literature in America as the Pre-Eaphaelite group 
were related to literature in England. The models for their 
juvenile work were the English poets who had form and music 
— Keats, Shelley, Tennyson. Among the slight affectations 
common to all, or at least to all but Stedman, was a fondness 
for Oriental themes. Stoddard has his "Oriental Songs,'' 
and Aldrich his collection. Cloth of Gold. The ideal of 
poetry which these men held was different from that of the 
New Englanders and, in the view of many persons, higher. 
Their achievement was by no means to be despised. Still, 
they never attained a popular recognition at all approaching 
that of Emerson, Longfellow, Lowell, Whittier, and Holmes. 
In explanation of this it has been said that the older poets so 
occupied the public mind that no attention was paid to new 
ones. The true reason seems to be that they lacked, except 
here and there, as in Aldrich's "Baby Bell,'' the touch of 



The Central Period 383 

common nature which endeared even the mediocre verse of 
Longfellow and Whittier to the mass of uncritical readers. 
On the other hand they often failed — whether for lack of 
genius or because of diversity of interests — of that absolute 
perfection of form which makes a poem an undying work of 
art. More recent writers have inclined to their view of poetry 
rather than to that of the New England school, and it may 
be that their influence was more valuable than their achieve- 
ment. This can hardly be known with certainty until the 
tendencies of later verse are more clearly evident than they 
are to-day. 

New York attracted many writers of verse who, after their 

arrival in the city, had little direct connection with any literary 

set. From Ohio came, in 1852, the Gary sis- 

Phabe^Carv *^^^^ *^^ J^^^S women who from pure love 
of writing had begun to compose verses under 
most discouraging conditions in their western home, and who 
had published a joint volume of poems in Philadelphia in 1850. 
The elder, Alice (1820-1871), wrote a number of prose tales, in 
the best of which she sketched western life as she had known it. 
Both she and her sister Phoebe (1824-1871) are now, however, 
remembered for their poems. Alice was the more voluminous 
' writer, and critics have usually credited her with the greater 
poetic gift ; but none of her verses has equalled in popularity 
Phcebe^s hymn beginning ^*^One sweetly solemn thought/^ 
or her humorously philosophical juvenile poem, 

Suppose, my Uttle lady, 

Your don should break her head. 

The verses of both incline toward sentimental moralizing. 
Those of Alice are likely to be more deeply pathetic, and to 
take a more intense view of things ; those of Phoebe are more 
hopeful, have more humor, and are sometimes, it seems, a 
little more genuine. Phoebe occasionally takes a shrewd and 



384 American Literature 

kindly view of life that suggests Whittier. Some of Alice's 

early poems show the influence of Longfellow's moralizing 

lyrics. 

Much younger than the poets already mentioned was 

Emma Lazarus (1849-1887). She was born in New York 

city^ of an orthodox Jewish family of Portu- 
Emma Lazarus i i an i i 

guese descent. She was precocious, and her 

first volume of poems was published when she was but 
eighteen. Her early work was influenced by her devotion 
to art and music, by Heine, and by Emerson, whom she knew 
personally. In 1871 she published Admetus and Other 
Poems, and in 1876, The Spagnoletto, a tragedy with the 
scene in Italy in the seventeenth century. The outbreak of 
anti-Semitic feeling in Europe about 1879 aroused her sym- 
pathy for her race, and from that time until her death she. 
gave her best energies to the cause of her people. A collec- 
tion of miscellaneous poems issued in 1882 bore the title 
Songs of a Semite, The Dance to Death is a blank verse 
drama based on the persecution of the Jews in Thuringia. 
Among her other works were translations from Heine, and 
from some of the Hebrew poets; Alide, a romance based on 
Goethe's Autobiography; some ^^prose poems'' ; and magazine 
articles on questions relating to the Jews. In much of her 
work are seen a fine artistic quality and a trace of the rich 
sensuousness of her race. Some of her earlier narrative 
poems, like ^^Admetus" and ^^Tannhauser," tell old legends in 
good blank verse, with much originality, and remarkably 
visualized description. Epochs, a cycle of poems with simple 
lyrical movements, touches on some of the serious problems 
of life with great genuineness. Her later poems on Jewish 
themes are more stirring, but show no loss of artistic power. 
Her ^^prose poems," which suggest Whitman, are less success- 
ful, as are the dramas. Of the latter, The Dance to Death 
has most merit. 



The Central Period 385 

Among lesser poets who came to New York was William 
E. Wallace (1819-1881), a native of Kentucky. His early- 
occasional poems like ^^The Battle of Tippe- 

Lesser New canoe'^ have music and life, but are close inii- 

York Poets . ^ 

tations of Byron and at times of Halleck and 

Holmes. Throughout life he was successful in growing 
showy flowers from seed furnished by other poets. His patri- 
otic lyric ^^The Sword of Bunker Hill/^ though conventional, 
is less imitative than most of his work. Thomas Dunn 
English (1819-1902) was born in Pennsjdvania and lived at 
different times in Virginia and New Jersey, but did most 
of his literary work in New York. He edited a literary maga- 
zine, wrote novels and plays, and engaged in an exciting 
quarrel with Poe. His poems are varied in character, but he 
is remembered only for his sentimental songs. Of these, 
^^Ben Bolf ^ attained great popularity when it was published 
in the "New York Mirror^^ in 1843, and was recalled to 
favor when it was inwoven in the plot of Du Maurier^s Trilby 
half a century later. William A. Butler (1825-1902) came 
from Albany to New York for the practice of law. His 
miscellaneous writings include letters of travel, humorous 
sketches, papers on art, novels, biography, and several occa- 
sional poems. His genius was satiric, and his greatest suc- 
cess was achieved in Nothing to Wear, a take-off on the 
wardrobe of a society woman. The popularity of the poem 
is due rather to its content than to the poet's art. Charles 
G. Halpine (1829-1868) was an Irishman, a graduate of 
Trinity college, Dublin, who entered the journalistic field in 
New York about 1852. At the beginning of the war he en- 
listed, and it was while he was at the front that he began to 
write for the New York "HeraW a series of articles over 
the signature of Private Miles O'Eeilly. The prose that these 
contain is of little account, but some of the poems attained 
considerable popularity. These and Halpine's other verses 



386 American Literature 

ran smoothly, and had a local and temporary application 
that gave them vogue, but they are now unimportant. To 
New York state, though not to the city, belongs Alfred B. 
Street (1811-1881), for over thirty years state librarian at 
Albany. He was born in Poughkeepsie, and spent his early 
years in the picturesque region near the Hudson. Almost 
all his verse treats of nature, which he portrayed with great 
accuracy, but with little imagination. His poems were 
highly praised in their day, but are of the sort that satisfies 
a critical theory rather than appeals to the heart, and are 
now almost forgotten. 

The most famous and the most difficult to criticise of the 
New York poets during the mid-century was Walt Whit- 
man (1819-1892). He was born on Long 
Island. His father and mother were of Eng- 
lish and Dutch ancestry, respectively. His father was a 
carpenter, but most of the Whitmans had been farmers. 
Walt, or as he was named Walter, attended the Brooklyn 
common schools, and at the age of fourteen learned to set 
type in a printing office. He taught country school for a 
winter or two, but most of the time until he was thirty 
years of age he was employed about Brooklyn and New York 
newspaper offices as compositor, contributor, editor, and 
what-not. In 1848 he made a leisurely journey to New 
Orleans, where he had been offered an editorship on the ^^Cres- 
cent.^^ Soon afterward he returned at a still more leisurely 
pace by a roundabout route through the West and North. 
He next published a paper and kept a bookstore, and a little 
later took up the business of building and selling small dwell- 
ing houses in Brooklyn. It was some time in the early fifties 
that he conceived the idea of writing Leaves of Grass, and he 
brought out his first volume bearing this title in 1855. Late 
in 1862 he went South in search of his brother, who had 
been wounded at Fredericksburg, and during the rest of the 



The Central Period 387 

war he ministered to the sick and wounded soldiers in the 
hospitals at Washington — serving not as regular nurse, but 
as visitor, friend, and almoner to those who needed his atten- 
tions. He secured a clerkship in the Department of the 
Interior, but was removed in 1865 as the author of an im- 
moral book. Friends soon procured him another clerkship 
in the office of the attorney-general, and he held this until 
1873, when he was incapacitated for service by a stroke of 
paralysis. From this time until his death in 1892 he lived 
the life of an invalid or semi-invalid at Camden, I^ew Jersey. 
Whitman^s writings before he was thirty-five years of age 
were those of a miscellaneous contributor to the newspapers 

and magazines. The few examples which he 
^ . . included in his collected works consist of 

rather halting conventional verses, and little 
moral tales and sketches, which usually leave a sense of in- 
completeness, and imply a deficiency in the author^s sense of 
literary form. The peculiar manner which he afterward 
used almost exclusively in his poems was first employed in 
his volume published in 1855. As a designation for all his 
poetical works after this date he adopted the name Leaves of 
Grass. From 1855 to 1891 inclusive he issued ten successively 
enlarged volumes under this title, each containing his com- 
plete poems to the date of publication. The first issue, 1855, 
was printed partly by Whitman himself, and appeared in 
Brooklyn without the name of a publisher. The edition of 
1881 was suppressed in Massachusetts on the ground that 
it was obscene. Many other bibliographical facts concerning 
the various forms of the book are of interest to the special 
student. Before his death the author also collected into one 
volume such of his prose work as he wished preserved. His 
most important essay, ^^Democratic Vistas,^' appeared in 1870. 
The prose volume also includes ^^Specimen Days,^' a scrappy 
series of autobiographic memoranda, and many short mis- 



388 American Literature 

cellaneous pieces. The Letters to Peter Doyle, The Wound- 
Dresser, made up chiefly of letters to his mother, the Diary 
in Canada, and other posthumous publications are of some 
biographic value. 

The main facts of Whitman^s life as already given are well 
known; but there is a scarcity of the more detailed informa- 
tion that would enable one to form a sure 
Character^ estimate of the man and his character. 

Though far from reticent so far as his ordi- 
nary actions were concerned, he was secretive regarding other 
affairs. His relations to women have been a subject of much 
discussion and conjecture, which is justifiable in so far as 
further knowledge of his life might aid in the interpretation 
of some of his poems. In his Bohemian days in Few York 
he indulged in all the dissipations of a great city. Late in 
life he admitted that he was the father of children still liv- 
ing, but nothing is known of their mother or mothers, or 
of the circumstances that attended his breaches of conven- 
tional social usage. His later life was, so far as direct evi- 
dence shows, exemplary. The charge of disgustingly intense 
egotism has been brought against him, and has been strenu- 
ously denied. So far as this rests on the use of the first 
person in his poems it may be considered as disproved; but 
there are other facts not easily explainable on any other 
theory. He took pleasure in commendation by any news- 
paper, no matter how insignificant, and he was in the habit of 
writing notices of himself and distributing them to editors 
and reporters. His personal letters, in which the pronoun 
"I^^ can surely have no unusual meaning, tell seriously and 
with monotonous frequency the most absurdly trivial details 
of his life. The persistent use of the nickname "Walt^^ in- 
stead of his baptismal name Walter, and the habitual wearing 
of a distinctive dress, seem to show an affectation that is 
found only with egotism. On the other hand many of his 



The Central Period 389 

letters and other prose writings indicate a man of great 
genuineness^ simplicity, and unselfishness. The impressions 
that he made on others were various. His friends and some 
casual acquaintances speak of the charm of his personality. 
Others agree more nearly with Thomas Wentworth Higgin- 
son, who says that he seemed^, in Lanier^s phrase, a "dandy 
roustabout/^ and gave the impression "not so much of manli- 
ness as of Boweriness.^^ 

From the mass of conflicting evidence it seems probable 
that "Whitman was in youth a man of perfect bodily health, 
though not a man of athletic temperament, or one who took 
much pleasure in his own bodily exertions. He was mentally 
alert and wonderfully sensitive to the impressions made by 
the varied activities of human life. Nature appealed to him 
most strongly in her larger and freer aspects, such as the sea; 
and man in his aspect of energetic, practical, creative 
laborer. He took great pleasure in the society of omnibus 
drivers, ferry boat pilots, horse car conductors, and other men 
of rude manners, but of real capability. His trip to the 
West and South added to his knowledge of the common people 
of America. This affection for men, not in mass, but as 
individual living human beings, was his most marked char- 
acteristic. He wrote, "There is something in staying close 
to men and women and looking on them, and in the contact 
and odor of them, that pleases the soul well.^^ It is significant 
that notwithstanding his advocacy of the American ideal he 
never thought of enlisting in the Civil War and fighting for 
a principle. Once his sympathies were aroused, however, 
by the sight of the sufferings in the army hospitals he volun- 
tarily gave to individuals services more valuable and more 
trying than those of most soldiers in the field. To this hos- 
pital experience he recurred more frequently and with greater 
satisfaction than to anything else in his career. It is to The 
Wound-Dresser and the hospital passages of "Specimen Da-ys^^ 



390 American Literature 

that those who doubt after reading the poems should turn 
before forming an adverse estimate of the man. Personally 
he was much given to posing, but his moments of genuine- 
ness made a powerful impression on those who were so fortu- 
nate as to behold them. 

The impulse that led to the writing of Leaves of Grass 
is believed by the poef s worshippers to have been an inspira- 
tion akin to that of the older prophets-. To 
Writog"* unsympathetic critics it has seemed an at- 

tempt on the part of a man who had failed 
in ordinary literary forms to attract attention by oddity. 
Neither of these judgments is probably wholly true. The 
doctrine of the importance of the individual human soul, as 
announced by Emerson and other transcendentalists, may 
have suggested to an experimenter in literary fields the idea 
of a new and different literature of which this doctrine 
should be the center. Once started, he became a lifelong 
apostle of what he called democracy. After a study of both 
his prose and his poetry it is hard not to believe that, though 
he was egotistical and self-conscious, he was in the main 
sincere. He evolved his poems with pains at first, and fre- 
quently revised and elaborated them afterward. As he con- 
sidered Leaves of Grass a unified work rather than a collec- 
tion he took equal pains in regard to grouping and arrange- 
ment. 

The most striking characteristic of Whitman's poetry is 
its lack of ordinary verse form. Except in a few cases it 
is without rhyme or sustained metre. For 
these it substitutes a rude and irregular 
rhythm, akin to that which is found, it is said, in the chants 
of primitive peoples. Many lines, often first lines, are 
examples of the highest rhythmical effects; but two lines 
with the same rhythm are rarely found together. An attempt 
to read such work as verse is sure to result disastrously. To 



The Central Period 391 

appreciate it, one should read it as he reads the finer parts 
of the King James version of the Bible, simply as rhythmical 
prose. Treated in this way much of it will be found to have 
a subtle melody which is more and more impressive as the 
ear becomes accustomed to it. The author says that many of 
the poems were directly inspired by music ; and some of them 
suggest in a vague way the movement of great orchestral 
pieces. 

The power of Whitman^s poems comes, not so much from 
long passages taken as wholes, as from short suggestive 
phrases. It is probable that in other poetry this is true more 
often than is generally realized. The success of rhymes 
in which good phrases are deliberately woven together to 
make nonsense, and the frequency with which readers are 
moved by sounding verse that they do not fully understand, 
illustrate how much is due to the suggestiveness of telling 
words and groups of words. The art of making these effec- 
tive phrases Whitman had in a remarkable degree ; and he also 
relied much on the picturing power of simple terms. This 
he carried to an extreme in his long catalogues of objects or 
attributes, often thrown together promiscuously: 

The athletic American matron speaking in public to crowds of lis- 
teners, 

Males, females, immigrants, combinations, the copiousness, the indi- 
viduality of the States, each for itself — the money-makers, 

Factories, machinery, the mechanical forces, the windlass, lever, 
pulley, all certainties. 

The certainty of space, increase, freedom, futurity, 

In space the sporades, the scattered islands, the stars — on the firm 
earth the lands, my lands. 

If this sort of thing is ever poetry it is because the reader 
finds in the long list some items that appeal to his imagi- 
nation. 

Whitman^s chief idea, as has been said, is that of democ- 
racy. By this word, as he shows in his chief prose work 



393 American Literature 

^^Democratic Vistas/' he means a conception of man and 
of the universe to which all earlier civilizations have been 

tending, and in accordance with which shall 
Whitman's ^^^^^ ^j^^ j^jj^g^ development of the future. 

Philosophy ^ 

He accepts something resembling the transcen- 
dental doctrine of the individual. In his many poems written 
in the first person he uses "V' and ^^me'^ to designate not 
alone himself, but every man and woman. Moreover, he 
believes that as all objects, actions, and attributes are part 
of the divine scheme, nothing is to be despised or thought 
unworthy of celebration in poetry. The severest censure 
which he received was directed against those poems in which 
he extended this theory to the phenomena of sex. Sex is, 
according to the poet, as pure and as natural as anything else 
in human experience, and should be treated as freely. Much 
may be said in favor of this theory as a theory, but the results 
of its application are displeasing to most persons. The 
majority of Americans are also too puritanical to accept a 
new poetry of the sex relation from a man whose own life 
had not conformed to conventional standards of morality. 
It may indeed be questioned whether if Whitman had married 
and become the father of a family he would have written 
some of the passages which have given offence. In view of 
the fact that so many prejudices and preconceived notions 
enter into our estimate of poems on this subject, it is safer 
to judge first of the author when he violates not moral but 
purely esthetic sensibilities. His whole philosophy stands 
or falls with such passages as 

The malform'd limbs are tied to the surgeon's table, 
What is removed drops horribly in a pail ; 
or, 

Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am 

touched from, 
The scent of these arm-pits, aroma finer than prayer. 



The Central Period 393 

All men honor the surgeon, and any sqneamishness on his 
part would be a misfortune to humanity. In the eyes of 
science there is no essential difference between the biologic 
processes that produce beautiful or repulsive forms, or be- 
tween the chemical processes that yield pleasant or unpleasant 
odors. The question is whether art is as inclusive as science. 
This every reader must answer for himself; and his answer 
will decide the question whether, for him, Walt Whitman is 
the prophet of a new poetry. 

Such a prophet the author undoubtedly believed himself 
to be. He proclaimed that the poetry of the future was not 
His Conception only to be new in substance and form, but 
of his Art -jj^at it was to supersede all that had gone 

before. It was to sing of the artisan equally with the noble, 
of the body equally with the soul, of death equally with life. 
In form it was to be unrestricted by laws of metre, it was to 
use the slang of the street as well as bookish diction, and, in 
America, it should contain French and Spanish expressions in 
proportion as French and Spanish elements enter into national 
life. It was to celebrate ^^adhesiveness,^^ an extraordinary, in- 
tense friendship between man and man, which is perhaps the 
most perplexing of the author^s conceptions. All these charac- 
teristics, which he enumerated in ^^Democratic Vistas^^ and 
other prose essays, are seen in his own poems. From the first 
conception of Leaves of Grass he apparently held his views al- 
most unchanged. His later poems have a little less of the 
physical and more of the spiritual element, and are slightly 
less eccentric in form; but the difference indicates only an 
advance in years and experience, not a change of philosophy. 

The reader who rejects Whitman as a philosopher and a 

prophet should not summarily dismiss his poetry as unworthy 

of attention. To such a critic a careful study 

of his work will show many deficiencies and 

many beauties. Among the deficiencies are the lack of any 



394 American Literature 

romantic element, of humor, and of sure taste. Eomantic love, 
or even the more tender emotions centering around childhood, 
is rarely mentioned. The relations of the sexes and other rela- 
tions within the family are thought of much as a sociologist 
might think of them. The lack of humor and of sure 
taste go together. The author was unable to see the ridicu- 
lous side of his own work. His long catalogues of things, 
his affected use of strange words, and his incongruous group- 
ings of ideas were by no means necessary results of his poetic 
theories. His prose, though readable and valuable for the 
light it throws on the author and his views, has even more 
artistic defects than the poems. Sentences are scrappy and 
disconnected, often ungrammatical. On the other hand, al- 
most anyone may gain inspiration, as did John Addington 
Symonds, from the broad free view and the contagious 
optimism of the poet. To those who care for the picturing force 
of words his many exquisite lines and phrases are sure to 
appeal; and many readers will find in the subtle melody of 
his finer compositions, as, for example, ^^When Lilacs Last in 
the Door- Yard Bloom'd,^^ a charm rarely equalled in more 
formal verse. 

Whitman has been the unfortunate center of a fierce dis- 
cussion in which both friends and enemies have gone to 
extremes. A letter from Emerson commend- 
ing the first edition of Leaves of Grass, which 
with questionable taste Whitman made public, was misun- 
derstood, though it helped to gain the popular ear. The 
Good Gray Poet, an excited, illogical pamphlet in which 
W. D. O'Connor expressed his indignation at Whitman's 
dismissal from the Interior Department, was the first and 
perhaps the worst of a series of absurd defences and pane- 
gyrics. On the whole these writings of foolish friends did 
the poet more harm than the attacks of his enemies. The 
most bitter attacks were based on misunderstandings of the 



The Central Period 395 

poems. Critics who grasped the author's theories but believed 
them wrong have mostly written with calmness and dignity. 
In Europe, especially on the Continent, it has been the fashion 
to look on Whitman as the one distinctively American poet, 
in whom the American idea found its appropriate expression. 
This is due in part to a misconception of American civiliza- 
tion, in part to the fact that the poet's ideas harmonize with 
those of the most audacious old-world reformers. For many 
years the majority of American critics spoke of Whitman 
only to ridicule his form and condemn his morals, and the 
great mass of Americans, whom he claimed to represent, 
found his work unreadable. He is still almost unknown to 
the common people for whom he wished to speak. Cultured 
readers, however, have come to take his poems more seriously. 
Much of the admiration professed for his work is intelligent, 
but the element of fad may be seen in the fact that many 
persons are equally devotees of Whitman and of Poe — two 
men whose theories of poetry are the most diverse and irrec- 
oncilable to be found in literature. While his extreme 
manner has found few imitators, his influence has been strong 
on recent poets both in England and America. 

VI. Pennsylvania Writers 

Philadelphia continued as in the earlier years of the cen- 
tury to be a literary center of importance without numbering 

among its permanent residents many writers 
Periodkals^^ of high rank. It was noteworthy, especially 

before 1860, for the publication of annuals 
and popular magazines. Among the latter "Godey's Lady's 
Book'^ and ^^Graham's Magazine^' long held national repu- 
tations. Some of the more important editors of these, like 
Griswold and Poe, did most of their literary work elsewhere. 
Others of lesser consequence, like Mrs. Sarah J. Hale, Eliza 



396 American Literature 

Leslie, and a little later Willis Gaylord Clark and E. T. 
Conrad, fairly belong to Philadelphia. 

Mrs. Sarah J. Hale (1788-1879), bom Buell, was a native 
of New Hampshire. At the age of thirty-four she was left 
a widow with five small children, and, as she 
Minor ^ ^as fond of reminding her readers, turned to 

Editors literary work for support. For some time 

she conducted the ^^Ladies^ Magazine^^ in 
Boston, and in 1837 became editor of "Godey^s Lady^s Book.^^ 
She also edited annuals, among them the ^^Opal,^^ and was 
the author of a novel, a tragedy, several volumes of poems, and 
other miscellaneous work. Her prose and verse are both 
highly moral and commonplace, even for writings of their 
class. Eliza Leslie (1787-1858), a contributor to "GodeyV' 
and editor of an annual, the "Gift,^^ published besides a 
classic cook-book some mildly humorous tales and sketches. 
Willis Gaylord Clark (1810-1841), a twin brother of Lewis 
Gaylord Clark, was editorially connected with several Phila- 
delphia journals. His poems, in smooth academic form, 
incline to melancholy — a fact that may be associated with 
the early death by consumption of both his wife and himself. 
His prose, on the other hand, consists mostly of brief humor- 
ous sketches. Eobert Taylor Conrad (1810-1858), a Phila- 
delphia lawyer, in early life editor of two newspapers, and 
later of ^^Graham's Magazine,^^ was the author of a few 
poems and of three plays, of which "Aylmere, or the Bond- 
man of Kent,^^ was successfully acted by Forrest. 

A more important editor and miscellaneous literary worker 
w.as Charles Godfrey Leland (1824-1903). He was born in 
Philadelphia, and after taking his degree at 
G dfr ^ L 1 d P^i^ceton and studying abroad contributed 
to many of the leading magazines of the 
country. For a time he edited a Philadelphia newspaper. 
He had wide interests and a fondness for curious researches. 



The Central Period 397^ 

One of his early writings was on "The Poetry and Mystery of 
Dreams ;^^ and later he published the results of interesting 
studies on the gipsy language and customs, on the legends of 
the Algonquins, on the early discovery of America by the 
Chinese, etc. Besides these he wrote sketches of travel and 
edited a series of art manuals. He was a careful observer, 
and what he has to say is valuable; but his prose works are 
sometimes slightly but unfortunately flippant and discursive. 
His most popular literary work was the Hans Breitmann 
Ballads, which began to appear in 1857. These are bur- 
lesques in German-American dialect on the peculiar ideal- 
istic German who was turned loose on America by the troubles 
of 1848, and below the broad fun on the surface they show 
the author's interest in the study of odd tj^pes of character. 
Leland was associated with a group of Philadelphia writers 
which included Eobert Montgomery Bird, George H. Boker, 
Bayard Taylor, and, a little apart from the 

A Group of others, Thomas Buchanan Eead. These men 

Philadelphia t . . i i? j.i x- x- • -i j? 

Writers agreed m caring much lor the artistic side oi 

literature. The more typical members of the 
group. Bird, Boker, and Taylor, all attempted dramatic com- 
position. 

Eobert Montgomery Bird (1805-1854) was educated as a 
physician, but early turned to literature. He began with 

plays, of which the most famous, ^^The Gladi- 
Robert ator,^^ was a favorite with Porrest, the actor. 

Bij.^ He then wrote Calavar and The Infidel, two 

romances of which the scene is laid in Mexico, 
and followed these by other fiction. All his work is of a 
highly romantic order. His stories are weak in plot, but hold 
interest by a succession of incidents. 

A far abler man was George H. Boker (1823-1890). He 
was a native of Pennsylvania and a graduate of Princeton, a 
man born to wealth and social position, who followed litera- 



398 American Literature 

ture because he loved it. During the war he was the leader 

of the Union League Club of Philadelphia^ and later was 

minister to Turkey and to Russia. After 
George H. Boker . -, j. i? j. -i • 

^ some early poems he wrote lour tragedies, 

"Calaynos/^ ^"^Anne Boleyn/^ ^^Leonor de Guzman/^ and 
^^Francesca da Eimini.^^ His Plays and Poems, collected in 
1856, include two lighter dramatic compositions. Later pub- 
lications were Poems of the War, Street Lyrics, KoenigsmarJc 
and Other Poems, The Booh of the Dead, and a volume of 
Sonnets. 

Boker's tragedies have intense and over-romantic plots, 
and make use of all the old-fashioned devices of the dramatist. 
"Calaynos^^ and ^^^Leonor de Guzman'^ have Spanish settings. 
The best is ^^Francesca da Eimini,^^ which still holds the 
stage. The story as told by Dante is amplified, and so man- 
aged that the hearer is led to sympathize with all three lovers. 
The prominent use of the court fool in developing the action 
and the frequent asides are conventionalities which were more 
tolerable sixty years ago than they are to-day. In spite of 
artificiality, however, the story has unity and consistency, and 
never drags. The blank verse is well handled, though it does 
not rise to great heights. Boker's lyrical poems sometimes sug- 
gest Shelley and occasionally Tennyson, but can never be 
called imitative. His sonnets, which Leigh Huiit thought 
the best on the legitimate model produced in America, show 
rather too much influence of the Elizabethan sonneteers. 
His work, throughout, is that of a man of taste and enthusi- 
asm for literature who has a considerable, but not the high- 
est, literary gift. 

Bayard Taylor (1825-1878), or as he was known until early 

manhood James Bayard Taylor, was distinctively a product of 

Pennsylvania, though many of his literary 
Bayard Taylor .,, ' .xi_ at tt i n x. r. 

associations were with New York, and he has 

already been mentioned in connection with the New York 



The Central Period 399 

group. He was born in Kennett Square, Chester County, 
Pennsylvania. His ancestry included both Quaker and 
Lutheran elements. After a precocious boyhood, in which 
he showed his fondness for books, he spent a short time in an 
academy, and at seventeen was apprenticed to a country 
printer. Even before this he had contributed poems to the 
Philadelphia papers, and in 1844 he published on the advice 
of Griswold his first volume of poems. He had always wished 
to travel, and now, on the strength of the slight literary repu- 
tation derived from his book, he secured contracts from sev- 
eral papers to write letters from abroad. His first visit to 
Europe, which occupied two years and covered parts of Eng- 
land, Scotland, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, and France, was 
made at an expense of about $500. His newspaper letters 
were collected in 1846 into his first book of travel. Views 
Afoot, 

From this point Taylor's varied and industrious career 
cannot be traced in detail. For a time he published a country 
- p paper, and then went to New York on 

the staff of the ^'Tribune.'' In 1850 came 
the culmination of the tragic romance of his life. He had 
long been betrothed to Mary Agnew, a Quaker girl. For 
some time it had been evident that she was afflicted with 
consumption, and the lovers were married in full antici- 
pation of her death, which occurred two months later. The 
success of Views Afoot and the author's love of new scenes 
united in urging him to travel. He went to California in 
the days of the gold excitement; and before his death he had 
the Holy Land, India, Iceland, and most corners of the more 
visited, besides many sections of the United States, Egypt, 
frequented countries. From all these places he wrote letters, 
which were afterward collected into volumes. It was in 
Germany that he felt most at home; and here, in 1857, he 
married Marie Hansen, who survived to write his life and 



400 American Literature 

edit his works. After his second marriage he bought a tract 
of land and built a mansion near his boyhood home. The 
desire of founding an estate, which has been disastrous to so 
many men of letters, was strong upon him. He went beyond 
his means and although he slaved at lecturing and literary 
hackwork, he was still embarrassed financially. Just as all 
things began to look brighter he died, in 1878, soon after he 
had taken his place as United States minister to Germany. 

It was partly the pressure of external circumstances and 
partly the inherent activity of his mind that led Taylor to 

undertake so many kinds of writing. Besides 
Taylor's Poems . , i. i i i i 

•^ the merest hackwork, such as newspaper cor- 

respondence, editing, and compiling school histories, he at- 
tempted various forms of poems, the drama, books of travel, 
short stories, novels, literary essays, literary burlesques, and 
translations ; and at the time of his death was planning a life 
of Goethe. He is said to have valued his own prose lightly, 
but to have cared much for the name of poet; and it is in 
his poetry that his development may best be traced. Of his 
first two or three volumes of poems, little need be said except 
that they possess some of the qualities of the later work. 
Poems of the Orient, 1854, shows how strong a hold the East 
took on his passionate nature. Few other poets have put 
into their work so much of the sensuous spirit of the Ori- 
ental lands and still kept themselves so free from sensuality. 
These poems show the influence of Shelley, and are over- 
intense, over-rhetorical, yet the best of them must be ranked 
high among American lyrics. The Poet's Journal, 1862, is 
a sort of serious medley, with a little of a story told, and more 
implied by interwoven lyrics. It is really the account of the 
author's first and second loves, and culminates with the birth 
of his child. From this time on the echoes in his poems are 
of Tennyson rather than of Shelley, and there are hints of 
Swinburne, and, in subject and treatment, of Lowell. From 



The Central Period 401 

this time, too, he felt moved to attempt higher things in 
poetry. The Picture of Saint John, 1866, Lars, a Pastoral 
of Norway, the ^^Gettysburg Ode/^ and above all his dramatic 
works and the translation of Faust are more ambitious than 
anything that he had undertaken before. 

Taylor's moral ideals were as pure as those of the New 
England poets, and at bottom he had some of their tendency 
to didacticism. Like his associates in New 
of^^oetrv^ York, however, he believed that the highest 

quality of poetry is beauty. His artistic in- 
stincts were strong in all directions, and at times he devoted 
himself with some earnestness to painting. In his early 
years he inclined to the prevailing sentimentalism, and later 
there was an element of artistic mysticism in his work. 
His taste ripened late, as none knew better than himself. 
In the end, his critical judgment was stronger than his 
creative power. As a result, his later work — indeed nearly 
all after the Poems of the Orient — seems too carefully 
wrought out to move the reader. The odes and many lyrics 
in ^Trince Deukalion'^ and other works have few flaws in 
structure, but they lack the charm of the Shelleyan and 
rhetorical ^^Bedouin Song.'^ Taylor was a true poet, who fell 
just a little short of fulfilling his great promise. 

Of the original dramatic works ^^The Prophet'^ is the only 
one that is strictly a drama. The subject, Mormonism, is 
ill adapted to a play, the structure is poor, 
Dramatic Works and the blank verse is by no means the au- 
thor's best. "The Masque of the Gods'' and 
"Prince Deukalion" are dramatic poems in which spirits and 
the Gods of old speak. They teach, in a veiled allegorical 
way, the author's later religious beliefs. The best parts of 
both are the lyrics that are frequently interspersed. "Prince 
Deukalion" shows the influence of the author's study, of 
Faust. The translation of Goethe's masterpiece is probably 



402 American Literature 

Taylor's highest achievement. He devoted to it some of the 
best years of his life ; and though he had not high scholarship, 
he had the scholarly enthusiasm that stops at no labor. Crit- 
ics of his FaiLst have generally given high praise to the subtle 
interpretation of the original. 

The novels^ Hannah Thurston, John Godfrey's Fortunes, 
The Story of Kennett, and Joseph and his Friend, appeared 
between 1863 and 1870. The scenes of all are 
laid in America and the first three are in 
part autobiographical. Hannah Thurston is another of the 
many unsuccessful attempts to write a story of American 
village life. It deals with the reforms and -isms of the 
mid-century, and shows how Taylor felt toward some of his 
strict neighbors. The plot is poorly organized and the story 
often drags. John Godfrey's Fortunes was evidently sug- 
gested by some of the author's literary experiences. The 
scenes, and to some extent the incidents, in Kennett are 
avowedly drawn from life in his own neighborhood. As 
novels, none of these works ranks very high; but they show 
some of the author's views, and especially his thorough Ameri- 
canism and belief in democracy. The short stories, potboilers 
written for magazines, are in structure little better than the 
novels. 

Taylor's critical essays, as represented in the volume col- 
lected by his wife, are mostly disappointing. They rarely 
show insight; when they are best they are 
x!^*.^? commonplace, and when they differ from re- 

ceived opinion they are often absurd. The 
Echo Club is a series of burlesques suggested by early literary 
recreations of Taylor, Stoddard, O'Brien, and others. 

Taylor's best prose work is probably that which he valued 
least, his books of travel. He had an observing eye, a ready 
sympathy, and good powers of description. He rarely moral- 
ized, or sentimentalized, or lectured on history or science. 



The Central Period 403 

He knew better than to write long descriptions of nature with- 
out introducing in some way a human interest. He told 
his own experiences^ keeping himself in the 
Boo sot center, and still his narratives never seem 

egotistical. It is doubtful if truer, saner, 
better written books of travel have been produced in America. 
Even to-day, when such works are wholly out of fashion, 
the reader who picks up one of these old volumes is loth to lay 
it down. 

Taylor felt when he accepted the ministry to Germany that 
he was just getting ready for his best work. It may be 
P . doubted whether if he had lived his literary 

hopes would have been gratified. He was too 
much the victim of circumstances, he had too many ambitions, 
he attempted too many kinds of work, to do his best; and it 
is uncertain just how great that best might have been. He 
became, with the possible exception of Whitman, the most 
eminent literary man of the middle states in his time; and 
the sweetness of his personality, his conscientious industry, 
and the disappointment of his aspirations constituted a 
tradition which, after his death, tended to perpetuate his 
memory. How much of his work, aside from the translation 
of Faust, will be remembered in fifty years is a question 
hard to answer. 

Thomas Buchanan Eead (1822-1872) was born in Chester 
County, Pennsylvania, of parents in poor financial circum- 
stances. He was apprenticed to a tailor, but 
Thomas ran away to Philadelphia and afterward to 

j^g^^ the West. Before he was twenty years of age he 

had been grocer's clerk, cigar-maker, sculptor, 
sign-painter, actor, and artist. Much of his later life was spent 
abroad, where he painted the portraits of many distinguished 
people, and less successful fanciful pictures. His many poems 
were published at intervals from 1847 to his death. Among 



404 American Literature 

them are The New Pastoral in thirty-six books, which treats of 
pioneer life in America, The House hy the Sea, The Wagoner 
of the AlleghanieSj a tale of Eevolutionary times, and The 
Oood Samaritans, Besides these longer works he wrote many 
lyrics and shorter poems. He had the artistic instinct, in 
verse as in painting, but he wrote too freely, and with too 
little self-criticism. He had a fondness for strongly accentu- 
ated rhythms, for lines rhyming in triplets, and for me- 
chanical arrangements of his poems. He is at his best in 
his lyrics, of which the most popular example is "Sheridan^s 
Eide.^^ 

VII. Southern Writers 

In the South conditions were still unfavorable to the pro- 
duction of literature. There were fewer cities than in the 

North, and hence fewer literary centers; and 
th*%^*^t^ ^^ facilities for publishing were not so readily 

at hand. Both custom and temperament in- 
clined the more cultured Southerners to the appreciation rather 
than the creation of literature; and if they wrote at all it 
was likely to be for recreation, and in the spirit of a dilettante. 
It is noticeable that though the patricians were often the 
most generous contributors to Southern literary magazines, 
a good proportion of the writers who are best remembered, 
such as Poe, Simms, and Timrod, represented less exclusive 
social circles. Before the war politics offered the most attrac- 
tive field for men of intellectual tastes who might have at- 
tained some excellence in letters. Indeed, most historians of 
Southern literature have enlarged their lists of authors by 
including men who are chiefly distinguished in political his- 
tory. Southern statesmen maintained, as they always have, 
a high average of excellence as orators and as writers on 
public affairs, but few of them merit much consideration as 
men of letters. The war left the South unfitted, for a few 



The Central Period 405 

years, to do much in literature. Although a considerable 
number of Southern writers have since arisen, most of them 
belong to the period after 1883. 

Baltimore was always a center of culture, particularly of 
Eoman Catholic culture ; and in the latest years of the period 

Johns Hopkins University attracted men de- 
a imore voted to the newer scholarship. Baltimore 

periodicals were among the best in the South. 
Among the writers who were temporarily drawn there were 
Poe and Father Eyan. Few, however, of the permanent 
residents of the city deserve mention. George H. Calvert 
(1803-1889), a descendant of the founder of Maryland, 
lived near Baltimore until 1843, when he removed to Ehode 
Island. He studied at Harvard, at Goettingen, and later 
edited a Baltimore paper, and published translations from 
the German, and many original works, both prose and verse. 
His prose essays show an attempt to be aphoristic, and at 
times suggest the influence of Emerson, but are on the 
whole a rather artificial expression of commonplace thought. 
His two plays, in blank verse, seem to have been modelled on 
the more intense work of the Elizabethans. His poems are 
characterized by artificial diction. His work is that of a 
gentleman of culture and wide interests, who is not quite 
sure in taste, and who allows himself to be over-ambitious. 
The literary career of Sidney Lanier (1842-1881) is asso- 
ciated with the newer intellectual movement in Baltimore, 

though the greater part of his life was spent 
ey anier f^p^j^gp South. He was born in Macon, 
Georgia, of good family, though not of the oldest Southern 
aristocracy. His father was a successful lawyer. Even as a 
boy he was noteworthy as a musician. He entered Ogle- 
thorpe college, a small sectarian institution at Midway, 
Georgia, and on his graduation in 1860 was made tutor. 
His ambition was to study in Germany and become a college 



40G Americak Literature 

teacher^ but this was frustrated by the war. He enlisted in 
the Confederate army in 1861, and served in the line, as 
scout, and in the signal service. He was finally captured 
on board a blockade runner and confined in Point Lookout 
prison. After the war he was clerk in a hotel, principal of 
an academy, and from 1868 to 1872 an assistant in his 
father's law office. His only important publication up to this 
time was Tiger Lilies, a novel begun while he was in the 
army, and finished in 1867. He had always retained his 
interest in literature and music, however, and had worked 
when time permitted on a volume of prose essays and on a 
long poem, ^^The Jacquerie,^' neither of which was ever com- 
pleted. In the winter of 1872-3 he resolved to devote himself 
to the life of an artist and a scholar. 

Even before this he was afflicted with consumption, but he 
did not lose hope. He went to Baltimore, where he played first 
flute in the Peabody Orchestra, and revelled in 
Lanier in ^j^^ opportunities for study afforded by the Pea- 

body library and the newly-organized Johns 
Hopkins University. Prom this time until his death in 1881 
his life was a brave struggle against disease and financial 
embarrassment, and in the last years a race with death to 
see how much he could accomplish before the end. At first 
he was obliged to leave his wife and children at the South, 
but after a time the returns from his music and from his lit- 
erary work enabled the family to live quietly at Baltimore. 
"Corn,^^ his first poem to attract much notice, was published 
in 1875. This aided him in forming several literary friends, 
and through one of these. Bayard Taylor, came the invita- 
tion to write the cantata for the opening of the Centennial 
Exposition. This made him better known, though the pro- 
duction itself adds little to his poetic fame. His first volume 
of verse appeared in 1877. A book on Florida, 1876; The 
Boy's Froissart, 1878; The Boy's King Arthur, 1880; The 



The Central Period 407 

Boy's Mdbinogion, 1881; and the posthumously published 
Boy's Percy were hackwork^ though the editing of the old 
romances was by no means distasteful to him. He organized 
classes of ladies for the study of literature, and in 1879 was 
appointed lecturer in English literature in Johns Hopkins. 
He projected several scholarly works, of which he published 
only one, The Science of English Verse, 1880. Since his 
death have appeared several volumes of his writings, includ- 
ing a complete edition of his poems, his letters, some collec- 
tions of his essays, and his lectures on The English Novel 
and on Shakespeare and his Forerunners. 

All who knew Lanier testify to his personal charm. He 
was a man of wide interests and broad views and sympathies. 
While he never lost for a moment his devotion 
anier s ^ ^^^ South, after the war he accepted the 

inevitable, and looked to the future rather 
than the past. He was born in one of the more democratic 
of the Southern states, and he responded to influences that 
were not strong in the South — notably modern scientific 
thought and German transcendentalism. He was able, there- 
fore, to stand in close relations with men in both sections of 
the country. The pathos of his life, his personal sweetness, 
his relations to the new and the old South, and to one of 
the younger American universities all make his story one of 
interest, but tend to render difficult a just estimate of his 
importance. By his admirers he has been praised as a scholar, 
a prose essayist, and a poet. 

Lanier had some of the characteristics of a scholar — in- 
terest in many subjects, a consciousness of his own deficien- 
cies, and an ambition to learn. While in the 
Scholarshio army, and while at work under the most dis- 

couraging circumstances in the South, he 
managed to learn many things, and particularly to become 
well read in older English literature. When he decided on a 



408 American Literature 

literary career he felt the need of a broader and more 
thorough trainings and set himself to acquire it. His biogra- 
pher prints an interesting letter in which^ in 1877, he ap- 
plied for a fellowship at Johns Hopkins University in order 
that he might study the physics of musical tone, mineralogy, 
botany, comparative anatomy, French, and German — a course 
which he goes on to say ^^akes straight towards the final 
result of all my present thought/^ There is a strange mix- 
ture of the ludicrous and the pathetic in the idea of an in- 
valid of thirty-five proposing to master these diverse branches 
of knowledge in order that he might become a poet. With all 
his enthusiasm, however, he lacked the patience and the sound 
judgment of a true scholar. He was too ready to speak and 
write before he had investigated his subject deeply and made 
certain of his conclusions. It would be unfair to judge him 
severely on account of his India papers, imaginative maga- 
zine articles into which he worked much half-assimilated guide- 
book information, or by his lectures on the novel and Shake- 
speare; but the same unripeness is evident in The Science of 
English Verse, which he deliberately published as a contribu- 
tion to scholarship. His lack of sure judgment is shown in 
his tendency to give the highest praise to minor writers who 
took his fancy. 

The exuberance and lack of sureness which characterized 
his scholarship also account for the chief defects of his prose. 

His early novel. Tiger Lilies, is strained, rhe- 

Lanier's Prose , - i -i p -i? i • • mi 

torical, and overianciiul m imagery. These 

faults he outgrew to some extent, but few pages of even his 
latest prose are wholly free from them. This is the more sur- 
prising since he himself points them out in an early bit 
of self-criticism. A few of his letters are charming revela- 
tions of a charming personality, but most of them — even those 
to his wife — are highly artificial, full of bookish words, and 
archaic forms, and unnatural, involved sentences. 



The Central Period 409 

Lanier's chief literary ambition was in the direction of 
poetry. He wrote : ^^I know . . . that I am in sonl^, and shall 

be in life and utterance^ a great poet/' His 
Lanier's achievement can in fairness be judged only 

of Po^ry ^^ connection with his theories of mnsic and 

poetry. To his mind the relations between 
these two forms of art are far closer than has usually been 
supposed. He believed that a poem should have a solid basis 
of idea^ but he emphasized the fact that it should appeal to 
the ear through subtle effects of appropriate tone-color and 
rhythm. It is the form rather than the idea that is strik- 
ing in his verse. Indeed^ his thought^ except in poems like 
the "Hymns of the Marshes/' in which he shows the response 
of his imaginative temperament to the influence of nature^ 
is likely to be commonplace. The ideas that maize rather than 
cotton will save the agricultural industries of the Souths 
which underlies "Corn/' and that the nation is too much 
absorbed in sordid trade^ which underlies "The Symphony/' 
seem when stated baldly to be hardly worth the poet's while. 
Worse than the triteness of his ideas is his torturing and 
twisting them in strange long-drawn-out figures and odd 
conceits. As a poet even more than as a prose writer he 
found it impossible to think and speak simply^ clearly^ and 
naturally. What Edmund Gosse calls his "strain and rage" 
was probably due not alone to a striving after poetic effect in 
accordance with his theories, but to the immaturity of his 
taste and thought. For, although he was in his fortieth 
year when he died, he seemed as immature at the end as some 
boys of twenty. 

Among Lanier's most striking poems are "The 'Symphony/' 
"The Marshes of Glynn/' and "Sunrise." In the first the 

author attempts to suggest by both the music 

Lanier's Poems n j_i • j j? Trx? i. x £ j.i 

and the idea oi diiierent parts oi the poem 

the effect of different orchestral instruments. In the other 



410 American Literature 

two poems the verse is even more musical and more arti- 
ficial. His use of alliteration and tone-color, and some of 
his rhythms, suggest Swinburne — the modern English poet 
whom he most disliked. Better than the longer poems, 
though less distinctive, are a few lyrics in which he deliberately 
and avowedly worked out a conceit. Among these is the 
much praised ^^Ballad of Trees and the Master,^^ which, with 
its pun on the word ^^tree,^^ is after all somewhat forced. 
Still better is the ^"^Evening Song,^^ in which are blended with 
remarkable effect the Elizabethan and the nineteenth century 
conceptions of love. 

Lanier wrote at a time when I^orth and South were becom- 
ing reconciled, and when Northern critics, in their desire to 
be fair, gave eager recognition to a promising 
Southern man of letters. He attracted little 
attention abroad, but at home he had, and still has, a consider- 
able body of enthusiastic readers. Even these are wont to 
admit that he must be judged not so much by what he did 
as by what he would have done. He stands as the most dis- 
tinguished literary man of the New South; but it is by no 
means certain that when the careers of the many successful 
Southern writers now living are completed he will deserve 
this distinction. 

If Virginia had a literary center it was Eichmond, which 
in the old days was a city of much culture. Here was pub- 
lished the ^^Southern Literary Messenger/^ 
B ^iT^^ c k ^C)st frequently remembered in connection 
with Poe, but the leading magazine of the 
South both before and after his editorship. Other and 
shorter lived periodicals had considerable merit. Among the 
representative Virginia writers was Philip Pendleton Cooke 
(1816-1850), a graduate of Princeton. He studied law, but 
devoted himself largely to writing and sportsmanship. He 
published in the periodicals a few prose tales and part of a 



The Central Period 411 

romance. His only volume was Froissart Ballads and other 
Poems, 1847. The preface announces the plan of turning 
stories from Froissart into verse^ but only three such narra- 
tives are given. The rest of the volume is taken up with verse 
tales of his own invention^ and miscellaneous poems, includ- 
ing his best remembered lyric, ^*^Florence Yane.^^ The author 
may be taken as a type of the Virginia gentleman of family 
and wealth who dabbled in literature for his own pleasure. 
His younger brother, John Esten Cooke (1830-1886), came to 
take letters more seriously. After studying law he turned 
his attention to romance writing, and in 1854 published three 
works. Leather StocJcing and Silk, The Virginia Comedians, 
and The Youth of Jefferson. The scenes of all these are 
laid in Virginia in pre-Eevolutionary times. Leather StocJc- 
ing and Silh is a tale of pioneer days in the Shenandoah 
Valley. The Youth of Jefferson is a story of college life at 
Williamsburg, based on tradition and on some slight hints 
in the early letters of Jefferson. It is an intensely romantic 
story of love and gallantry, in which the heroine dons male 
attire and becomes the confidante of her poor and bashful 
lover. The Virginia Comedians, often ranked as the au- 
thor^s best work, is another romantic tale of pre-Eevolution- 
ary times, full of intense devotion on the part of handsome 
cavaliers and of languishing on the part of the ladies. The 
plot is poorly organized, especially in the latter part; and 
an attempt to gain historic interest by introducing Patrick 
Henry is unsuccessful. Phlegmatic readers of the present 
day may doubt whether this artificial romantic society ever 
existed, but it is the society which tradition loves to paint 
as that of the old regime in the South, and which Cooke was 
especially fond of reproducing in his novels. He wrote several 
other stories in the same strain, though after the war, in 
which he served with distinction, he turned more to scenes 
from 1860 to 1865. Besides fiction he wrote a life of Stone- 



U13 American Literature 

wall Jackson and other biographical and semi-historical 
works. He was one of the most prolific writers of the Old 
South and many of his works are still in print. All are char- 
acterized by devotion to Virginia and by the air of the old- 
time romancer. Haste in composition and the inability to 
construct good plots account for the fact that his stories do 
not stand higher in their class. 

Virginia was also the native state of Abram J. Eyan (1839- 
1886), whose wanderings in the service of his church after- 
ward took him through nearly every Southern 
wXs^^^^^^^ state. He entered the Eoman Catholic priest- 
hood and became a chaplain in the Confed- 
erate army. His poems stand to Eoman Catholicism and 
devotion to the South as the more sentimental poems of the 
New England writers do to puritanism and loyalty to the 
Union, respectively. They have a swing that catches the 
popular ear and they are full of sincere emotion. Many 
are on distinctly religious subjects, many on the lost cause. 
The greatest favorites are "The Conquered Banner/^ and 
"The Sword of Lee/^ but several of the religious poems are 
really better. Mrs. Margaret Junkin Preston (1820-1897) 
was a native of Philadelphia, but lived most of her life at 
Lexington, Virginia, and became closely identified with the 
South. Her earliest publication was a novel, Silverwood, 
but she was more successful in her poetry, of which she pro- 
duced several volumes. Her work shows some influence of 
Mrs. Browning, and is praised by her admirers for grace, 
delicacy of finish, purity of sentiment, and an intense religious 
element. Her poems are usually free from blemishes due to 
bad taste, and they show wide interests and some feeling ; but 
they lack positive qualities which would entitle them to high 
rank. Her journals and letters give an interesting view of 
experiences during the war. 

It is difficult to identify Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) 



The Central Period 413 

with any section of ihe country. By family relationship he 

was a Southerner^ but he was born in Boston, received much 

of his schooling in England, and did his most 

^ effective literary work in Philadelphia and 

New York. He was not so much a cosmopolitan as a man 
independent of place and environment. If any section can 
lay claim to him it is the South, and if any state of the South, 
Virginia. 

It is impossible to discuss Poe^s position as a writer without 

some reference to the unfortunate controversies that arose 

regarding his life and character. When he 

Controversies ^j^^ ^^ jg^g ^^ named as his literary executor 
Regarding Poe -^ 

the Eeverend Eufus W. Griswold, whose 

labors as editor and compiler have already been mentioned. 
The relations between Poe and Griswold had been strained, 
and Poe had at one time expressed a bitter contempt for 
Griswold and all his works; but he apparently believed that 
there had been a complete reconciliation. A few days after 
Poe^s death Griswold published in the New York ^^Tribune'^ 
an article the tone of which may be inferred from the state- 
ments that Poe ^^had few or no friends/^ and that ^^There 
seemed to him no moral susceptibility; and what was more 
remarkable in a proud nature, little or nothing of the true 
point of honor." Griswold claimed, and it is charitable to 
believe, that when he wrote this article he was ignorant of 
the trust which Poe had imposed upon him. When, a little 
later, he undertook the preparation of a memoir to accompany 
Poe's works, he felt that he must adhere to his former state- 
ments, and he painted the author's character blacker, if 
possible, than before. When there was conflict between two 
authorities as to a fact, or two interpretations of an action, 
he uniformly chose the more unfavorable ; and it is as certain 
as circumstantial evidence can make it that he falsified docu- 
ments to support his case. This picture of depravity appealed 



414 American Literature 

to people who since the days of Byron had been fond of 

associating genius with the diabolical^ and in spite of protests 

by N". P. Willis and others who knew Poe it was long accepted 

as true. At length the reaction set in^ and apologists went 

to ridiculous extremes in an attempt to prove Poe^s character 

spotless. Even to-day the reader is sometimes troubled to 

decide just what he should believe. 

It was not altogether Griswold^s fault that hardly half the 

statements in his memoir are correct. Poe himself, whether 

through mere perversity, or for some other 
Poft's Life 

reason, gave currency to many wild tales re- 
garding his life. The main facts are now, however, well 
established. He was born in Boston, where his parents were 
playing a temporary theatrical engagement. His father, 
who belonged to a respectable Southern family, had been 
disowned by his relatives when he went on the stage, and a 
year later had married an actress. Both parents died when 
Edgar was very young, and he was adopted by Mr. Allan, a 
merchant of Eichmond, Virginia, who afterward acquired 
considerable wealth. From 1815 to 1820 the Allans were 
'abroad, and Edgar was in a boys' school in the suburbs of 
London. He spent one year at the University of Virginia, 
where he made an excellent record for scholarship, but fell 
into the prevailing student dissipations. A quarrel with 
Mr. Allan over his gambling debts prevented his return to 
the University, and later led to his leaving home and to his 
disinheritance. He is said to have enlisted in the army, and 
to have served so faithfully that friends secured a discharge 
and an appointment to West Point. Here he neglected his 
military duties and was dismissed in 1831. Meanwhile he had 
published Tamerlane and Other Poems, hy a Bostonian, in 
1827; Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor Poems, in 1829; and 
another volume of Poems in 1831. After many vicissitudes he 
attracted the attention of some literary men of Baltimore, 



The Central Period 415 

who secured him a position as editor of the "Southern Lit- 
erary Messenger'^ at Eichmond. In 1835 he married his 
cousin, Virginia Clemm, a girl of thirteen. In 1837 he left 
Eichmond and went first to New York and then to Phila- 
delphia, where he was editor successively of "Burton's Gentle- 
man's Magazine'' and of "Graham's Magazine." In 1844 
he went to New York, and became connected with- the "Eve- 
ning Mirror," and afterward was editor and part proprietor 
of the "Broadway Journal." After this failed he wrote for 
various periodicals. In 1847 his wife died. In 1849 he went 
South to further a project, which had been the dream of his 
life, for founding an independent literary magazine. While 
in Eichmond he met Mrs. Sheldon, an old sweetheart, now 
a widow, and it is supposed that they became engaged. He 
started back to arrange his affairs in New York, but died in 
Baltimore. Most of his poems and prose tales were published 
in the magazines of which he was the editor. His longest 
tale, "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym," the first part 
of which appeared in the "Southern Literary Messenger,'^ 
was issued in book form in 1838. Collections of tales were 
published in 1839 and 1845, and a volume of poems in 1845. 

It is harder to speak of Poe's character than of his life, 
not so much because the facts are unknown as because it is 

difficult to interpret them. Poe was addicted, 

Poe's Character i 1 1 j? i x xi • i 

probably irom an early age, to the occasional 

use of intoxicants. His nervous temperament seems to have 
been such that a slight indulgence was productive of the 
worst results. He was not, at least during the greater part 
of his life, an habitual drunkard; but his weakness often 
prevented him from securing and holding regular employ- 
ment. There is evidence that after the death of his wife he 
took to the use of drugs ; and it is probable, though not certain, 
that his death in Baltimore was the result of a debauch. 
In his relations with other men Poe was not a saint, but 



416 American Literature 

he does not seem to have shown any serious moral obliquity. 
The worst stories told by Griswold have not been substanti- 
ated by later biographers^ and his letters show nothing worse 
than some duplicity in criticising friends behind their backs. 
He exerted a strong influence over women^ and in his later 
years had several intense ^^platonic friendships/^ at least one of 
which perhaps went a trifle beyond social conventionalities; 
yet there is no suspicion of moral wrongdoing. Indeed, both 
his writings and his life show a remarkable freedom from im- 
pure passion. His business relations have been the subject of 
detailed discussion, and even his failure to return a borrowed 
volume of no great value has been given a publicity that does 
not always attend delinquencies of this sort. In this case 
the discovery of a letter has proved him guiltless, not only 
of dishonesty, but of undue carelessness. There is no ques- 
tion, however, that he sometimes borrowed small sums of 
money that he was unable to repay; but there is nothing in 
these transactions to show deliberate dishonesty. Poe was, 
indeed, never mercenary, unless in his engagement to Mrs. 
Sheldon, and accounts of this affair are confused and un- 
certain. On the other hand the unselfishness of his devotion 
to his wife and her mother is shown by the testimony of all 
who knew the family, and by numerous letters written by 
Mrs. Clemm both before and after his death. 

Poe^s moral weaknesses were undoubtedly the chief cause 
of his failure in life, yet this does not mean that they were 
greater than those of many other men. Cir- 
M'V t ^ cumstances, which must be counted for some- 
thing, were against him. His boyhood was 
passed in the expectation of a comfortable position in life, 
and the fact that it was his own vices which led Mr. Allan to 
cast him off did not fit him the better to make his own way. 
In literature he was in advance of his time. Editorial labors 
which, even though interrupted by his fits of intemperance. 



The Central Period 417 

would now be worth great salaries, brought him but a few 
dollars a week. It is probable that his poems and prose tales 
now yield annually to many publishers who acknowledge no 
obligations of copyright sums larger than that which the 
author received from them during his entire life. Add to 
the lack of appreciation the fact that he had not the trick of 
making friends, and that he was too independent to worship 
the literary divinities of the day, and we have an explanation 
if not a palliation of much that was unfortunate in his life. 
Though a man of the finest nervous organization, he endured 
all his life the hardships of poverty. Worst of all, he was 
forced to see his invalid wife suffer, and perhaps die the 
sooner for want of the common comforts of existence. Had 
Poe been a model of thrift and propriety he could no doubt 
have eked out a comfortable existence on the money that he 
might have earned. But if his talents had brought him half 
the return with which they would have been rewarded a few 
years later, we should hear less about his moral faults. 

So much has been said of Poe^s life and character only be- 
cause these subjects cannot be ignored in a consideration of 
his works. Though he revealed himself much 

ffis Works ^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ supposed, the man and his 

works have always been inseparable in the 
popular mind. Critics, too, have been guilty of arguing in 
a circle, assuming that the writings were autobiographical 
because they dealt with sin and remorse, and then substan- 
tiating the popular conception of the author^s character by 
reference to his writings. 

Poe was a poet, a writer of prose tales, and a critic. His 

criticism, once dismissed lightly and held to be little more 

than the expression of bitter prejudices, is 

CritiSm ^^^ more widely read, and serves as the best 

introduction to his other work. As a critic 

he belonged to the school of Coleridge, though his ideas were 



418 American Literature 

mostly individual. He stood for literature as an art^ and for 
the idea properly expressed by the much abused phrase^ ^^Art 
for art^s sake/^ The object of a work of pure literature 
should be, he felt, to make a definite pleasurable impression on 
the mind, and this impression should be made for itself, and 
not for any ulterior purpose of giving information or incul- 
cating a moral. His most important ideas on the function 
of criticism in general are set forth in the letter prefixed to 
the Poems of 1831. His views of the poem are summarized 
in his popular lecture on ^^The Poetic Principle,^^ and applied 
in his many reviews of poems by other authors. His theory 
of the prose story is best expressed in his review of Haw- 
thorne^s Twice-Told Tales, 

It is sometimes said, uncharitably, that Poe so shaped his 
critical dicta as to give the highest place to the only kinds of 
literature that he could himself produce. This seems to be 
disproved by the fact that in ^^Al Aaraaf,^^ published when he 
was but twenty, and itself written in a form which his criti- 
cisms disapprove, he sets forth in a mystical way the idea 
of beauty which underlies his later theory of poetry. As he 
developed this theory he defined poetry as ^^the rhythmical 
creation of beauty,^^ and insisted that it should be treated 
as an art, not as the result of insane inspiration. The latter 
idea underlies ^^The Philosophy of Composition,'^ an essay 
in which he professes to give, with absurd detail, his method 
in composing ^^The Eaven.'^ It is a corollary to his theory 
of the function of poetry that the lyric is a higher form than 
the epic; and, indeed, he went so far as to say that a long 
poem could not exist. His conception of the short prose tale 
is stated less definitely. He preferred it to the novel, because 
it allowed greater unity and definiteness of impression. He 
considered that though a lower form than the poem, it had 
possibilities which the poem had not, since it admitted im- 
pressions like terror and mystery, while poetry should be 



The Central Period 419 

limited to the presentation of beauty. In regard to other 

forms of literature^ he laid down few general principles. A 

dramatic poem which was not an acting drama he was inclined 

to consider ^^a flat contradiction in terms.^^ 

In all his chief critical ideas Poe was in opposition to his 

most popular contemporaries. New England was dominant 

in American literature^ an.d N'ew England was 

Poe and His ^ represented by the intellectual didacticism of 
Contemporaries ^ "^ 

Peter Parley^ and the moral didacticism of 

Longfellow. The idea of inspiration and the ^^divine afflatus^^ 
prevailed; and the public admired the poet who could write 
his poems at a sitting, rather than the one who perfected his 
work by years of polishing. Considering the individuality of 
his ideas, his reviews were usually fair in essentials. There 
are exceptions, such as his bitter attack on Griswold, and he 
had some prejudices that influenced much of his critical 
work. Toward female writers he was likely to be unduly 
charitable — he gave unstinted praise even to such senti- 
mentalists as L. E. L. He had little friendly feeling for 
the New Englanders, partly because he differed so widely 
from their ideals, partly because it irked him to see them so 
popular while he was neglected, partly because he objected 
to their mutual admiration societies and log-rolling criticism. 
It was probably dislike of New England as much as love of 
the South that led him to pose occasionally as the repre- 
sentative of Southern ideas and institutions. Still, he always 
ranked Longfellow at the head of American poets, except 
when he wavered in favor of Lowell; and there is hardly a 
case in which he did not give a New England author as much 
praise as is conceded by posterity. 

Poe's contemporary reputation as a bitter and unfair critic 
was due to the unpopularity of his critical standards, to his 
independence and lack of tact, and to the fact that he allowed 
himself to ride several hobbies. Chief among these were 



420 American Literature 

grammar, versification, and originality. He rarely reviewed 

a prose work without quoting a list of expressions that were 

/n . . fTT ,.,-. grammatically incorrect. Usually, it must 
Critical Hobbies , -i -, , n t - . , m i i 

be admitted, his points were well taken. 

The same cannot be said of his criticisms on versification. 
When he trusted his ear he was usually right, but he often 
preferred to base his criticisms on pedantic theories of 
technique. His favorite hobby was originality. He admitted 
no degrees of legitimate indebtedness, but characterized 
every case of similarity as plagiarism. Longfellow was 
the object of his most persistent and most unreasonable 
attacks on this charge. All these hobbies touched points 
on which writers are extremely sensitive; and an author^s 
personal feeling toward the reviewer was influenced not by 
the pages of discriminating praise, but by the paragrapli 
that exposed his grammatical blunders and bad rhymes, or 
passed harsh judgment on his borrowings. 

Most of Poe's own writings conform strictly to his theories. 
The only exceptions in his verse are three long poems, pub- 
lished in early youth. ^^Tamerlane,^^ which 
Th^-^F^^^~~ ^PP^^^^^ when he was but eighteen, and 
which according to his own statement was 
written much earlier, shows plainly, though not obtrusively, 
the influence of Byron. Only an occasional favorite word 
like "bodiless'^ suggests the later verse. ^^Al Aaraaf,^^ pub- 
lished two years later, was evidently written under the in- 
fluence of Shelley. It is mystic and highly imaginative, and 
contains one lyric passage of rare and subtle beauty. It was 
originally prefaced by the sonnet, "To Science,^^ which 
shows the author^s youthful mastery of a form which he 
afterward rejected. The dramatic fragment, "Politian,'^ 
is the least valuable of the three, and shows Poe out of his 
element. In these early years he was beginning to work out 
the wonderful music of his verse. His masters were Cole- 



The Central Period 431 

ridge^ who may have suggested the use of the repetend, and 
Shelley, from whom he gained the trick of using a special 
vocabulary of onomatopoetic words. Later in life he took 
an occasional hint from Mrs. Browning, and perhaps from 
others. But what he borrowed he used in his own way, and 
he deserves the credit of originating a new effect in the music 
of English verse. The attainment of perfection was a mat- 
ter of years. Many of the poems as we now have them were 
of exceedingly slow growth. Their successive stages of de- 
velopment may be seen in the versions published, often with 
change of title, in the periodicals of which the author was 
editor. His judgment on a freshly written poem was by no 
means sure. ^^The City in the Sea,^^ ^^Ulalume,^^ and others 
contained, as first published, stanzas that are almost ridicu- 
lously weak. But he rarely reprinted without making 
changes, and nearly every change is an improvement. Among 
poems that date from the earlier time with relatively few 
emendations are ^^Israfel'^ and ^^To Helen.^^ ^^The Sleeper,'^ 
which Poe considered his best poem, was changed almost out 
of semblance to its original form. The poems of his later 
years, such as ^^The Eaven,^^ '^Ulalume,^^ and ^^Annabel Lee,'^ 
were of course subject to less revision. They exemplify, 
however, the artistic mastery of verse which he at last at- 
tained. ^^The Eaven^^ probably owes as much of its popularity 
to mere effects of sound as to the thought and imagery. 
"Ulalume'^ shows the author's highest attainment in the pro- 
duction of unusual effects by the use of the repetend and ono- 
matopoetic words. 

The subjects of the poems also accord with the author's 
theories of the nature of poetry. His ideals limited him to 

the lyric, and in writing lyrics he aimed at 
Th^*^ C^^T^T *^^ presentation of the highest beauty. In 

this, he tells us, there is always a touch of 
sadness; and the saddest of all thoughts are occasioned by 



422 American Literature 

the death of a beautiful woman. This theme is found in 
"The Eaven/' "Annabel Lee/' "Ulalume/^ "To Helen/' "To 
One in Paradise/' "The Sleeper/' and many more. In "Isra- 
fel/' "The Haunted Palace/' "The City in the Sea/' and 
others the element of sadness is present, but with different 
associations. Undoubtedly the range of ideas in the poem 
was limited by the author's conception of his art. War, 
happy love, and other usual themes of the lyric are wanting. 
The thought, too, is always subdued to a single emotional 
effect. It is not true, however, as is sometimes charged, that 
thought is absent, or trivial. Every poem except "The 
Bells," which is little more than a rhythmical exercise, has a 
definite and sufficient content, and can, if anyone desires, 
be paraphrased in prose. Even "Ulalume/' which some 
critics have pronounced meaningless, should offer no diffi- 
culties of interpretation to any person who understands the 
vocabulary and takes up the poem with no preconceived idea 
of its autobiographical significance. 

Poe's first published tale was "The MS. Found in a Bottle," 
which won a prize offered by the "Baltimore Saturday Visi- 
tor" in 1833. The others were published at 
Poe s Prose intervals, most of them in the periodicals 

with which he was connected. Many of those 
that are included in his collected works are trash — the per- 
functory output of a journalist who had to fill space. Poe 
himself is not responsible for the preservation of these pieces, 
and their mediocrity should not affect our judgment of his 
better work. His tales which are really excellent exceed in 
number those of any other American except Hawthorne. 
All these better stories, with the exception of the long "Narra- 
tive of Arthur Gordon Pym," conform to the author's critical 
theory. This restricted him to a single definite effect or im- 
pression in each tale. The variety of effects, though much 
greater than in the poems, was limited. He handled humor 



m 



The Central Period 423 

with only moderate success, and no humorous tale deserves 
a place among his productions of first rank. He succeeded 
best in the representation of mystery, horror, and terror. 
This fact suggests comparisons with the English novelists of 
terror, with the German romanticists, and with Hawthorne. 
In no case is the resemblance very clear. He differed from 
Monk Lewis and Mrs. EadcliflEe in making prominent not so 
much the terrible as the effect of terror on the human 
mind. The resemblance to Hoffmann and the German roman- 
ticists is plainer, but the evidence of indebtedness is not clear. 
It seems reasonably certain that Poe did not read German, 
and the explanation that he knew Hoffmann through French 
and English translations is not convincing. Like Hawthorne, 
he delighted in psychological analysis, particularly the analy- 
sis of a morbid or terror-stricken mind. But he pictured the 
mind troubled by mental disease or physical suffering rather 
than by moral questionings. 

The narrative method in the prose tales is that of a writer 
who wishes to make an emotional impression rather than to 

recount an action for its own sake. He suc- 
M^t^d^^ ceeds admirably in creating and sustaining 

what it is now fashionable to call ^^atmos- 
phere.^^ To aid in doing this he often employs the device of 
a colorless, almost an impersonal, narrator, whose comments 
serve the purpose of a chorus, but who takes little important 
part in the action. This is the case in ^^The Fall of the House 
of Usher,'' "The Descent into the Maelstrom,'' "The Murders 
in the Eue Morgue," and many more. Even when the nar- 
rator has a significant part in the story, as in "The Pit and 
the Pendulum" and "Ligeia," his personal traits are left 
vague and ill defined, and the reader thinks of him as passive 
rather than active. In the tales which have a more definite 
and everyday setting great care is taken to secure verisimili- 
tude by the use of realistic details in both the narrative aud 



424 AMERicAisr Literature 

the descriptive passages. This is shown to best advantage in 
the first part of "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym/^ "The 
Gold-Bug/^ the detective tales, and some of the newspaper 
hoaxes. The descriptions are, indeed, sometimes too long 
and detailed to suit modern taste ; and the same may be said 
of the expository passages in which, in a few tales, the author 
airs his philosophy. Usually, however, the tales are excel- 
lent in unity and proportion. 

A careful student of the stories soon notices the frequent 
repetition of a few ideas. The thought of a partial sentience 

of the body after death, or at least of an in- 
Ideas dissoluble relation between the soul and the 

body, is common, as in the "Colloquy of Monos 
and Una^^ and in "Morella.^^ With this may be connected the 
thought of premature burial, found in "The Fall of the 
House of UshcT,^^ and referred to in other tales. Eeference 
to the walling up of a dead body is found in "The Cask of 
Amontillado^^ and "The Black Cat,^^ and in a slightly differ- 
ent form in "The Tell-Tale Heart.'' These and a few other 
ideas recur constantly. 

This repetition of ideas makes any satisfactory classifica- 
tion of the tales difficult. There is great variety of subject 

and treatment, but tales that difler most 
Po^^s^Ta^^^^^ widely in other respects are often associated 

through the recurrence of some favorite idea. 
A few overlapping groups readily suggest themselves. The 
tales in which horror is painfully obtrusive, like "The Black 
Cat,'' "Berenice," and "The Facts in the Case of M. Valde- 
mar," deserve little attention. They are powerful, and they 
devebp some of Poe's favorite conceptions, but they indicate 
a partial lapse of taste, and it 'is the authors misfortune that 
they are so widely known. In "The Fall of the House of 
Usher," "The Pit and the Pendulum," "The Tell-Tale 
Heart," "The Imp of the Perverse," and "The Cask of Amon- 



The Central Period 425 

tillado" the portrayal of horror is subsidiary to the study of 

its effects on the mind, and the story is more artistic. "The 

Masque of the Eed Death^' is still more unreal, and connects 

itself with the rhapsodies "Shadow^^ and "Silence/^ which are 

prose trenching on the domain of poetry. In "Ligeia^^ and 

to a slighter extent in "Morella^^ and "Eleonora^^ the author 

carries us out of all place and time, and deals with the very 

mysteries of existence. 

It seems hard to believe that the same mind that conceived 

"Ligeia'^ planned also "The Gold-Bug/' "The Murders i^ 

the Eue Morgue/^ "The Mystery of Marie 

Poe^s Stories of Roget/' and "The Purloined Letter.'' The 
Ratiocination o ^ 

first of these is a story of the finding of buried 

treasure by means of a memorandum in cypher, and connects 
itself on the one hand with tales of adventure like the "Nar- 
rative of Arthur Gordon Pym,'' and on the other hand with 
the last three named. These three have the distinction of 
being the first detective stories, and in spite of countless 
imitations for more than sixty years they are still unexcelled. 
They represent a comparatively late period in Poe's literary 
work. While he was in Philadelphia he published a paper 
on methods of secret writing, and for a time amused him- 
self by reading all cyphers sent him. It was about the same 
time that he began to write his tales of ratiocina- 
tion. The scenes of these three stories are laid in Paris, and 
all have the same hero, M. Dupin. The thesis of "The Mur- 
ders in the Rue Morgue'' is that the more mysterious the 
aspect of a crime, the more readily should the facts be discov- 
ered by an acute reasoner. "The Purloined Letter" presents 
the converse of this proposition, that the simplest things are 
the most puzzling to ordinary minds. In "The Mystery of 
Marie Roget" the author dealt with a crime that had been a 
short time before the sensation of New York. He gave a 
French form to the name of the victim, Mary Rogers, ex- 



426 American Literature 

changed Paris for New York and the Seine for the Hudson, 
and endeavored to have M. Dupin settle, from information 
furnished by the newspapers, the responsibility for a crime 
which had baffled the police. His reasoning is plausible, and 
it is said that later revelations showed the truth of his theory ; 
but the necessity of adhering to fact, and of sifting much 
irrelevant testimony to show its worthlessness spoils the pro- 
portion of the story. 

This union of the intellectual, the ratiocinative faculty 
with the highly imaginative is the most distinctive character- 
istic of Poe^s genius. It was his own theory 

rr^^^o^?^}^^ that a mathematician could not reason well 
Two-Sided 

unless he were something of a poet. Certainly 
his imaginative faculty helped in the production of his in- 
tellectual tales; and his intellectuality doubtless aided as 
much in the creation of his poetry and his imaginative stories. 
The two together gave him an insight that accomplished what 
he could have done with neither alone. This was strikingly 
illustrated by his prediction, from the first few chapters, of 
the outcome of ^^Barnaby Eudge.^^ It is shown, also, in his 
article on the automatic chess player, and in many of his 
critical works. In some of his essays he called to his aid both 
intellect and imagination in forming conjectures of the 
things that lie beyond human knowledge. The prose rhap- 
sodies, the mystical tales like "Ligeia,^^ and the late "prose 
poem^^ "Eureka^^ all show how persistently he thought 
on the great mysteries of existence. It was probably this 
habit of questioning the unknowable that led him to the 
production of those tales that are too uncanny and weird. 
It is a mistake to suppose that these are only theatrical at- 
tempts at effect, or that they have no relation to life. Poe 
was forever thinking about life, and about its deepest prob- 
lems. Like any journalist, he sometimes wrote under com- 
pulsion, and to meet the popular demand. He lacked 



The Central Period 437 

thorough scholarly trainings though he was widely read;, and 
he sometimes attempted to conceal his limitations by tricks 
like those which he exposed in "How to Write a Blackwood 
Article/^ But when he was at his best he was not a charla- 
tan, but a conscious artist, using the tricks of his art only to 
secure the greater fidelity to truth. 

Poe^s genius was recognized to some extent before his death, 
but full appreciation of his worth has been a matter of slow 

s^rowth. It is the misfortune of such a writer 
Poe's Rank 

that his more obvious and less subtle work 

attracts most attention. "The Eaven'^ is still the most popu- 
lar of his poems, and "The Black Cat^^ is at least as well 
known as any of his tales. It was also his misfortune to be 
worshipped by a cult, against the extravagant claims of which 
saner readers felt bound to protest. He has, however, won 
the praise of the most conservative critics, and many later 
writers have done him the honor of imitation. Swinburne, 
Eossetti, and even Tennyson were influenced by his verse; 
Stevenson^s "Treasure Island'^ shows obvious similarity to 
"The Gold-Bug'^; Jules Verne took the hint for some of his 
extravagant sketches from the newspaper hoaxes; de Mau- 
passant and a host of short story writers in France, England, 
and America have acknowledged hinl as master; and the in- 
numerable writers of detective stories have modeled their 
work on "The Murders in the Eue Morgue'^ and "The Pur- 
loined Letter.^^ The fact that his works have given sugges- 
tions to such widely different writers is a sufficient answer 
to the remark sometimes made that Poe^s range is narrow. 
It is a just criticism that his range, though broad, did not 
include the more common forms and themes^ — the narrative 
poem, the love lyric, the love tale, and the presentation of 
commonplace truth in prose and verse. These are the stuff 
of which most literature is made, and the writer who lacks 
them has a restricted audience, and a somewhat weaker hold 



428 American Literature 

on all readers who have strong human sympathies ; yet there 
is much else in literature. With all his limitations Poe has 
attained a foreign reputation that is probably more secure 
than that of any other American author, and for the last 
fifty years has been steadily gaining in recognition at home. 

South of Virginia the only important literary center was 
Charleston. Here were established from time to time a 
number of short-lived magazines, and here 
Charleston— ^^^^ found several writers of national repu- 
Simms tation. The most important of these was 

William Gilmore Simms (1806-1870). He was 
a native of Charleston. When he was a mere child his mother 
died, and his father failed in business and went West, leaving 
him in the charge of his grandmother. After a brief and 
unsatisfactory schooling he became a drug clerk as a prelimi- 
nary to the study of medicine. By the time he was eighteen, 
however, he abandoned this occupation for the study of law. 
After a visit to his father in Mississippi, where he saw some- 
thing of frontier life, he practiced his profession in Charles- 
ton for a year, and then turned to literature. Between 1827 
and 1832 he was editor of a magazine and of a newspaper 
which successively failed, wrote tales and miscellaneous 
articles for the magazines, and published five volumes of 
verse. The last of these was his most ambitious poetical 
attempt, Atalantis. He went to New York to see it through 
the press, and began life-long friendships with Bryant and 
several other northern men of letters. In 1833 he brought 
out his first romance, Martin Faber, and a collection of 
short tales. The former is said to have been a harrowing 
story of crime, based partly on fact. The author afterward 
excluded it from his collected works. Guy Rivers^ a story of 
wild life on the frontier, was issued in 1834, and The Yem- 
assee, the first of his historical tales, in 1835. 

From this time on Simms^s literary activities were too 



The Central Period 429 

numerous to mention in detail. He worked indef atigably and 
with wonderful rapidity. Before the outbreak of the Civil 

War he had been associated editorially with 
lT^V half a dozen periodicals^ and had published a 

dozen or more volumes of verse, two dozen 
volumes of fiction, two dramas, and many miscellaneous works, 
besides a good share of the two hundred and fifty magazine 
articles which his biographer was able to identify. Meanwhile 
his first wife had died, and he had married a lady of some for- 
tune, and lived on her father's plantation near Charleston. 
He made frequent visits to New York, where most of his 
books were published, and during part of the year he lived 
in Charleston. Here, in the fifties, he became the center of 
a group of literary men, most of them younger than him- 
self, which included the poets Timrod and Hayne. Although 
after his second marriage he was in somewhat easier circum- 
stances financially, his life was not wholly pleasant. Charles- 
ton society, the most exclusive in the South, gave little recog- 
nition to the former drug clerk. His health began to fail ; he 
suffered afiliction in the illness and death of several of his 
children; his home was partly destroyed by fire; and he 
worried greatly over the political troubles that were agitat- 
ing his state. Long before the outbreak of the war he had 
become a strong secessionist, and a believer in the beneficence 
of slavery. He advocated extreme measures, and when the 
culmination came took great interest in the attack on Sum- 
ter, and made suggestions for fortifications, some of which 
were adopted. Throughout the war he continued to write, 
but as his connection with Northern publishing houses was 
broken off he printed only in Southern periodicals. The 
close of the struggle left him in poverty and broken in health. 
His wife had died during the war. His library and the rest 
of the buildings on his estate had been burned. He could 
support himself only by incessant writing. The kind of fie- 



430 American Literature 

tion which he produced was going out of fashion and he was 
forced to contribute stories to cheap Northern periodicals, or 
to send his work to ambitious Southern magazines which were 
unable to pay. Soon after the war he renewed his friend- 
ship with many of the Northerners whom he had known, and 
some of them were able to make life easier for him without 
wounding his pride. 

As has been seen, Simms tried most forms of writing in 
prose and verse. He began with verse, and it is said that he 

always esteemed his poems more highly than 
Simms's Poems . . t-t- t t t ji i • 

his prose. His readers disagreed with him, 

however, and this fact, though it disappointed him, led him 
to give more of his time to fiction. Most of his poetry was 
written before 1850. His earliest verses show considerable 
influence of Byron and Wordsworth. His longest poem, 
Atalantis; a Story of the Sea, was evidently written after 
reading Comus, The persons of the poem include the King 
of the Sea-Demons, a Princess of the Nereids, a Zephyr- 
Spirit, and several flesh and blood Spaniards. The poem 
opens with the princess enchanted upon a magical island 
raised by the King of the Sea-Demons, but, like Milton^s 
heroine, resolute in mind. The plot is resolved when one of 
the Spaniards, sole survivor of a shipwreck, becomes her 
lover and rescues her magic wand. Interspersed throughout 
the blank verse dialogue are some of the author's most melodi- 
ous or most nearly melodious lyrics. The other poems show 
considerable variety, but none of them is of great importance. 
Simms's best work is his fiction. Even this varies greatly 
in kind and quality. Some of the least known romances 

are psychological studies influenced by God- 
Ficti^n ^^^* Pelayo and Count Julian are based on 

romantic incidents in Spanish history, and 
The Damsel of Darien on the adventures of Balboa. The 
short stories were also in a variety of manners and on a va- 



The Central Period 431 

riety of subjects. The two important groups of his romances 
are those that deal with frontier life^ and those that are 
based on events in the colonial and revolutionary history of 
the South. In these he was trying to do for his section of 
the country what Cooper had done for the North. The border 
romances are tales of outlawry and crime^ exciting, but with 
little artistic merit. The chief are Quy Rivers, Richard 
Hardis, Border Beagles, Beauchamp, and Charlemonf. The 
scenes of the first four are laid in Georgia, Alabama, Mis- 
sissippi, and Kentucky respectively. More important, on 
the whole, are the colonial and revolutionary tales. These 
include The Yemassee, The Partisan, Mellichampe, The 
Kinsman (renamed The Scout), Katherine Walton, The 
Sword and the Distaff (renamed Woodcraft), The Foray ers, 
Eutaio, and others, some of them published only in maga- 
zines. The first of the series. The Yemassee, is usually con- 
ceded to be the best. The scene is in South Carolina during 
the colonial time, and the story is one of Indian warfare, 
with the usual love incidents. The characters, especially the 
Indians, are well portrayed, the descriptions of natural 
scenery are true and sympathetic, and the fights are exciting. 
Though the reader is many times reminded of The Spy and 
The Last of the Mohicans the book is far more than an 
imitation. 

Simms's two dramas, ^^Norman Maurice'^ and ^^Michael 
Bonham,^^ and his ^^dramatic essay,^^ ^^Benedict Arnold,^^ are 

far more crude than either his poems or his 
Miscellaneous romances; at least their form makes their 
Work crudities more noticeable. The blank verse 

tragedy, ^^Norman Maurice,^^ in which the 
hero, a lawyer and politician, triumphs over all sorts of dia- 
bolical enemies and becomes United States Senator from 
Missouri, reads in parts like a burlesque on a melodrama, and 
it is hard to realize that it is serious work, written when the 



433 American Literature 

author was in his prime. His miscellaneous works include popu- 
lar biographies of Marion^ Captain John Smith, the Chevalier 
Bayard, and Nathanael Greene, and treatises on the history 
and geography of South Carolina. He also edited several 
apocryphal Shakespeare plays, and in 1867 a volume of 
War Poetry of the South. 

Temperament, lack of critical training, financial necessi- 
ties, and indeed all circumstances conspired to make Simms 
a hasty and careless writer. He had all the 

Simms's literary faults of his Northern prototype, 

Importance r j r y 

Cooper, and much less of genius. Still, he 

deserves a place among American writers of romance, not 
merely as the leading representative of his class in the South, 
but as the author of several works that show more than a 
fair mastery of the difficult art of planning an exciting nar- 
rative. 

Among the younger men of letters who gathered about 

Simms were Henry Timrod and Paul Hamilton Hayne. 

Both were natives of Charleston of nearly the 

^^^ same age, and though they differed widely in 

social position they were friends from boyhood. Timrod 
(1829-1867) was of German ancestry, the son of a book- 
binder who sometimes made verses, and who achieved a lit- 
tle military distinction in the Seminole War. The death 
of the father left the family poor, and Henry was unable 
to complete his course at the University of Georgia. He 
studied law, but never practiced, and for some time served 
as tutor in a private family. At the opening of the Civil War 
he enlisted, but was obliged to leave the service on account 
of ill health. He made an unsuccessful attempt to act as 
war correspondent, and edited a paper at Columbia, South 
Carolina. When this city was burned he lost all his property. 
From this time until his death in 1867 his life was one of 
privation and suffering. He was already afflicted with con- 



The Central Period 433 

sumption, and he seems to have been of an impractical turn 
of mind, and unable to make the best of circumstances. 

Timrod's first volume of verse was published in Boston in 
I860, and was praised as a work of promise. In 1873 his 
friend Hayne collected his works and pub- 
lished them with a memoir. The poems by 
which he is best remembered were written during and after 
the war. Several of them are of the emotional sort which 
consists in praise of his state and objurgation of her enemies. 
They have fire and lyric swing; but a comparison of his 
^^Carolina^^ and Whittier's "Massachusetts to Virginia/^ 
poems with about the same proportion of intellectual and 
emotional elements, will show the lack of weight behind the 
Southern fierceness. "The Cotton BolV^ one of his best 
poems, has fine melodious passages, but seems less success- 
ful if it is read as a whole. Some of his personal poems 
and poems of nature show an ear for verse harmonies and 
a lyric gift. The bulk of his excellent work is, however, 
small. 

Paul Hamilton Hayne (1830-1886) came of an old South 

Carolina family. He was educated at the College of South 

Carolina in his native city, and then studied 

Paul Hamilton |^^. ^^^ ^^ ^^^^ abandoned his profession for 

letters. He was connected editorially with 
Charleston periodicals. Like Timrod, he served in the war 
until his health failed; and like him, he lost his library and 
his home by fire. He was left almost penniless, and removed to 
a few acres of land in the pine barrens near Augusta, Georgia. 
Here he remained until his death, supporting himself mainly 
by writing. He published volumes of poems in 1855, 1857, 
1859, 1872, and 1875, and a collected edition in 1882. In 
prose he wrote the lives of his uncle, Eobert Young Hayne, 
and of Hugh S. Lagare, and many magazine articles. At 
the time of his death he left a romance unfinished. As a 



434 American Literature 

poet Hayne was influenced by the more musical English mas- 
ters — by Chaucer and Tennyson, and to some extent by Poe. 
The bulk of his verse is considerable, and much of it gives 
the impression of having been written too easily. When he 
took pains and was at his best he attained to charming musi- 
cal effects. Almost all his poems are short. During the war 
he wrote patriotic lyrics that were intense, but not so bitter 
as those of his friend Timrod. In later years he became 
reconciled, in a manly and honorable way, to the new order, 
and while he never lost his devotion to the South, he wrote 
many poems that tended to a better understanding between 
the sections of the country. His writings, like his life, show 
the sweetness of his temper, his bravery in adversity, and his 
loyalty to his principles and his friends. In feeling for the 
subtle tones of verse he was inferior to Timrod, and he has 
received less praise ; but it is doubtful if he was not as true a 
poet, and a better representative of what was best in the 
South. 

It is only by the fact of residence and choice of subjects 
that Albion W. Tourgee (1838-1905) is classed with South- 
ern writers. He was born in Ohio, attended 
wSter^^^*^^^^ Eochester University, and served in the 
Union :army during the Civil War. In 
1865 he settled in North Carolina, where he held various 
offices, and as judge of the superior court was concerned in 
breaking up the secret political organization known as the 
Ku-Klux-Klan. After 1881 he lived in Pennsylvania and 
New York, and held appointments in the United States con- 
sular service. His first novel, Toineite, a study of social con- 
ditions at the South, made little stir ; but Figs and Thistles, 
A FooVs Errand, and BricTcs Without Straw, all published 
in 1879-80, and all dealing with Southern social and political 
conditions, were widely read. Later works touching on the 
same theme, among them Hot Plowshares, and An Appeal to 



The Central Period 435 

Ccesar, were less successful. His best work, A FooVs Errand, 
is based in part on his own experiences, and contains inci- 
dents said to have been revealed in the investigation of the 
Ku-Klux-Klan. It is the obviously partisan work of a man 
who wished to be fair, but who could not overcome his preju- 
dices. Some of the situations are strong and are told with 
considerable power. Unlike Uncle Tom's Cahin, with which, 
in the days of its popularity, it was sometimes compared, it 
lacked the art and the insight necessary to give it perma- 
nence. Dr. Frank 0. Ticknor (1822-1874), a physician and 
farmer of Columbus, Georgia, is remembered as the author 
of a number of smooth lyrics, with a faint touch of archaic 
simplicity, and some restraint. His best known poem, ^^Little 
Giffin of Tennessee,^^ is said to be based on fact. Most of 
his best pieces were written during the war, but they deal 
with home, friends, nature, and love of children, rather than 
with military achievements. They were not published in 
book form until 1879. 

With the Southwestern states were associated several 

writers of ISTorthern birth who became Southerners both by 

residence and by sympathies. William Wil- 

^^S^YJ'*^''!''^ berforce Lord (1819-1907), a native of N^ew 
the Southwest ^ ^ ^ 

York, was many years rector of an Episco- 
palian church at Vicksburg, Mississippi, and during the war 
was chaplain in the Confederate army. He published a 
volume of Poems, Christ in Hades, and Andre, a tragedy. 
His work is imitative, especially of Wordsworth. Albert 
Pike (1809-1891) was born in Boston, attended Harvard 
college, and taught for a time in New England. In 1831 
he went to the far Southwest, and after various adventures 
returned to Arkansas, where he became an editor and a law- 
yer. He served in the Mexican War and in the Confederate 
army. After the close of the Civil War he removed to 
Memphis and then to Washington. His twelve ^^Hymns to 



436 American Literature 

the Gods/^ eight of which were published in Blackwoods' 
Magazine^^ in 1839, were written while he was still a school 
teacher in New England. They are rhetorical apostrophes 
to the heathen deities, and show the influence of Coleridge 
and Keats, but are well sustained, and give promise of better 
things. The author's removal from literary associations and 
his interest in other activities probably account for his 
failure to fulfill this promise. His Prose STcetches and 
Poems, written in the Southwest, in the preface of which he 
says, ^^It is some time since I have seen the works of any poet,'' 
are naturally more interesting for subject matter than for ar- 
tistic excellence. He is best remembered as the author of 
^^Dixie" and a few other short poems, among them an ^^Ode 
to the Mocking-Bird," modelled to some extent on Keats's 
''Ode to the Nightingale." Mary Ashley Townsend (1832- 
1901), born in New York, and after her marriage a resi- 
dent of New Orleans, wrote under the pen name of Xariffa. 
Her humorous sketches in prose are forgotten, but her mildly 
sentimental poems hold for her a place in the anthologies. 

VIII. Western Writers 

In the early years of the period under discussion, before 
railroads had bound together the East and the West, the 

Ohio valley continued to maintain a fairly 
Western Writers ^^^^^^e group or school of writers. Like 

Flint, Hall, and other pioneers who were 
noticed in the preceding chapter, these men were most of 
them born in the East, but entered enthusiastically into the 
spirit of the West. They wrote on Western subjects, edited 
and contributed to Western periodicals, and often had their 
books printed by Western publishers. 

George D. Prentice (1802-1870) was a precocious Con- 
necticut boy who was graduated from Brown and became an 
editor at Hartford. In 1830 he left his paper in cliarge of 



The Central Period 437 

a promising young contributor, John Greenleaf Whittier, 

and went to Kentucky to gather material for a life of his 

political idol, Henry Clay. He was induced 

George D. ^^ remain, and continued until his death as 

Prentice 

editor of the ^^Louisville Journal/^ afterward 

the "Courier-Journal/^ He was a clever newspaper writer in 
a day when personalities and smart repartee were more the 
fashion than now. A collection of his best paragraphs was 
published in 1859 under the title Prenticeana, These are 
mostly quick, humorous thrusts at opponents and their ideas, 
and are not always characterized by delicacy. Of more im- 
portance were the author's poems, published at intervals dur- 
ing his life, and collected into a volume after his death. He 
was strongly influenced by Bryant, and some of his most 
popular pieces, such as "The Closing Year,'' are almost 
imitations in both idea and versification. He also wrote 
poems of lighter sentiment with the trite diction and imagery 
so common in his day. Some of these are faintly suggestive 
of Moore. 

William D. Gallagher (1808-1894) was born in Phila- 
delphia, but removed to Ohio at the age of ten. He edited 
several newspapers and short-lived magazines 
GaUaffher ' ^^ Cincinnati and other Ohio cities, and after- 

ward in Louisville. His interest in Western 
literature was always strong. Besides encouraging the 
writers of his section in the journals that he edited, he com- 
piled in 1841 Selections from the Poetical Literature of the 
West, He wrote many poems, of which the most ambitious 
was "Miami Woods." This contains sympathetic nature de- 
scriptions, and moralizings, mostly commonplace, on subjects 
suggested by the forest. The rather halting blank verse is at 
times reminiscent of Bryant, and perhaps of Byron and 
Cowper, and is interspersed with stanzas in unrhymed metres. 
Gallagher's miscellaneous poems are on various themes; some 



438 American Literature 

preach the democratic idea of the dignity of labor, and others, 
on tlie whole his best, picture various aspects of nature as 
seen in ihe West. 

Among the literary proteges of Prentice was Amdia B. 
Welby (1819-1852), born Coppuck, a native of Maryland who 
removed to Kentucky in childhood. She 
wrote over the signature of ^^Amelia^^ pas- 
sionate sentimental verses which went through many editions, 
and won for her a share of the praise which Poe was fond of 
distributing among poetesses. A writer of a very different 
sort, and one not so closely connected with the Kentucky- 
Cincinnati school, was Eobert Dale Owen (1801-1877). He 
was the son of the noted Scotch reformer Eobert Owen, and 
came to the United States in 1825 to aid in the establishment 
of a communistic colony at New Harmony, Indiana. After 
this failed he served in congress from Indiana, and held other 
political offices. Though somewhat erratic in his ideas he was 
a forceful writer on social and educational questions, and in 
his later years published several works on spiritualism. He 
also attempted a drama on the subject of Pocahontas, and in 
1874 published Threading my Way, an interesting though 
rambling autobiography covering his life until he settled in 
America. Among native Western writers was Henry M. 
Brackenridge (1786-1871), son of H. H. Brackenridge, the 
versatile author of Modern Chivalry. He was born in Pitts- 
burg and spent a considerable portion of his life in that city. 
As early as 1812 he published an account of Louisiana, and 
followed this by other miscellaneous historical and descrip- 
tive writing. His more important works are Recollections 
of Persons and Places in the West, 1834, and a History of 
the Western Insurrection, written to vindicate his father. 
His prose is pleasant and readable, without his father^s erratic 
humor. 

To the West of this time also belongs Abraham Lincoln 



The Central Period 439 

(1809-1865), whose qualities as a statesman have tended to 
distract attention from his ability as a writer and a speaker. 

In simplicity, candor, and pleasing directness 
A ra am ^^ expression his prose has probably been 

equalled by that of no other American publicist 
except Franklin; and he far excels Franklin when he mixes 
an emotional element with the intellectual. Even when he 
is slightly rhetorical, as in the ^^Second Inaugural Address,^' 
and to a lesser exent in the ^^Gettysburg Address,'^ he seems 
perfectly genuine. In acquiring this prose style Lincoln 
probably owed fully as much to the frankness and vigor of 
pioneer life in Kentucky and Illinois as to the frequently 
mentioned study of Shakespeare and the Bible. 

In the later years of the period the writers of the middle 
West were less closely associated. After railroads were 

opened they were more likely to publish their 
Writers ^^^^ books and to form their literary friendships 

in the East. As the region to which they 
belonged became less isolated their writings lost many of 
the distinctively Western characteristics. Moncure D. Con- 
way (1832-1907) was active in the anti-slavery agitation in 
Ohio, and wrote on a variety of subjects while pastor of a 
Unitarian church in Cincinnati. He was born of a slaveholding 
family in Virginia, studied law, entered the Methodist minis- 
try, became a Unitarian, attended Harvard divinity school, and 
preached as a Unitarian in Washington, Cincinnati, and 
London, England. He wrote on many things and was the 
friend of many distinguished men of letters in England and 
America. He cannot be associated definitely with any section 
of the country, but his career as an author virtually began 
in Cincinnati. J. J. Piatt (1835- ) has continued, in 
poetry, some of the traditions of the Ohio valley school. In 
Michigan Will Carleton (1845- ) has written simple bal- 
lads of domestic life. These men are still living. 



440 American Literature 

Edward Eggleston (1837-1902) was born in Indiana of 
Virginia ancestry. He attended school but two years and 

was mainly self-educated. He served as a 
Ec^eston Kethodist preacher and agent of a Bible 

society in Indiana and Minnesota, and after- 
ward edited juvenile papers in Illinois. In 1870 he removed 
to New York. His first novel. The Hoosier Schoolmaster, 
was published in 1871. This was followed by several others, 
the most important being The Circuit Rider, Boxy, The 
Hoosier Schoolboy, The Oraysons, and The Faith Doctor; 
and by some collections of short stories. In his later years 
Eggleston gave much attention to the history of the United 
States and wrote several popular historical works. He had 
a high ideal of the duties and the importance of the novelist, 
and in his stories of Western life he endeavored to paint ac- 
curately the scenes and the types of character which he knew 
in his boyhood. This painful sense of duty was fatal to artistic 
excellence. His attempt to show both the good and the bad 
sides of pioneer life and pioneer character interfered with the 
romantic effect of his stories, and yet did not assure realism. 
Nevertheless, the intrinsic interest of the life described and 
the author's moral earnestness secured great popularity for 
The Hoosier Schoolmaster, The Circuit Rider, and their 
successors; and they are still valuable for the glimpses they 
give of pioneer times. 

Another Indiana novelist, Lewis, or Lew Wallace (1827- 
1905), was a lawyer, who also served with distinction in both 

the Mexican and the Civil Wars. His career 

as a writer began late in life. The Fair God, 
1873, a story of the conquest of Mexico, is full of vivid de- 
scriptions, highly colored after Prescott, and shows consider- 
able archaeological research. Both this and Wallace^s most 
successful novel, Ben-Hur, a Tale of the Christ, 1880, are 
somewhat crude and melodramatic, but show a remarkable 



The Central Period 441 

power of realizing and picturing the details of unfamiliar 
scenes. His later works were The Boyhood of Christ, The 
Prince of India, a novels The Wooing of Malkatoon, a long 
poem in prosaic blank verse, and Commodus, a blank verse 
drama. These have all the faults of Ben-Hur and fewer 
excellences. 

John Hay (1838-1905) was born in Indiana, was gradu- 
ated from Brown University, and studied and practiced law 
in Illinois until 1861. He was private sec- 
^^ ^^ retary to President Lincoln, and held diplo- 

matic positions abroad until 1870. For a time he was edi- 
torial writer on the "New York Tribune.'^ After 1875 his 
residence was in Ohio, but he was much of the time in the 
public service. Under President McKinley he was ambassa- 
dor to England, and later secretary of state. The Pihe 
County Ballads were published while he was engaged on the 
"Tribune,^^ as was Castilian Days, the result of studies of 
Spanish life made while he was attached to the legation at 
Madrid. The Breadwinners, an anonymous novel of which 
he is generally conceded to be the author, appeared in 1883. 
In 1890 were published another volume of poems and the 
monumental work of Nicolay and Hay on Lincoln's adminis- 
tration. The Pihe County Ballads present the rough lan- 
guage and crude but intense ideas usually associated with 
the West. Some of the "Ballads'^ were wholly humorous, 
but the most popular, "Jim Bludsoe'^ and "Little Breeches,^' 
combine humor and pathos. Hay was not a great writer, 
but both his verse and his prose show that in addition to his 
capabilities for statesmanship and diplomacy he had the 
instincts of a man of letters. 

Another Western verse writer, whose work, if not his name, 
is most widely known of all, was Stephen C. Foster (1826- 
1864). He was born in Pittsburg and spent most of his life 
in that city and in Cincinnati. He was always devoted to 



442 American Literature 

music, and finally relinquished business to become an author 
and composer of songs. He wrote ^^Old Black Joe/^ ^^Old 

Folks at Home/' "Nellie was a Lady/' "Old 
Fo^er° Kentucky Home/' and many more songs in 

negro dialect, and also sentimental pieces, 
among them "Come where my Love Lies Dreaming." Though 
none of these belongs to the higher order of poetical or musi- 
cal composition, they are free from the cheapness and vul- 
garity of many of their class, and the popularity of some 
of them, notably "Old Polks at Home," has been almost 
universal. 

A geographical classification of authors makes no place for 
a wanderer like Eichard Eealf (1834-1878), but he was 

associated with the West, and his longest 

Richard Realf . ^ . i n . 

residence m one place, five years, was at 

Pittsburg. He was born in England, where his precocity 
secured the patronage of Lady Byron and others. At eighteen 
he published a volume of poems entitled Ouesses at the 
Beautiful, An intrigue with a woman older and of higher 
social rank than himself ruined his prospects and led him to 
come to America in 1854. He worked in the Five Points 
mission in New York, then went to Kansas, where he became 
associated with John Brown. Subsequently he visited Eng- 
land, lived for a time in the South, did newspaper work in 
Ohio, served in the Union army during the war, afterward in 
the regular army, and was editor of a Pittsburg paper. In 
the end he committed suicide in California. At various 
times he was a proselyte to the Eoman Catholic church and 
student in a Jesuit college, lecturer for the Shakers, and appli- 
cant for admission to the Oneida community. He seems to 
have married three women, all of whom were living, undi- 
vorced, at the time of his death. There was probably a 
touch of insanity in his nature which accounted for his 
vagrant and non-moral career. In one of three sonnets 



The Central Period 443 

written on the night of his death he spoke of himself as ^^a 
great soul killed by cruel wrong/^ but he rarely mentioned 
or even commented indirectly upon his own life. On the 
other hand many of his poems on love and friendship are 
strong and apparently genuine. His work shows a combina- 
tion of idealism and sensuousness that suggests the Pre- 
Eaphaelites. His poems were published in the ^^Atlantic/^ 
"Scribner's/^ and other periodicals, and have been collected 
since his death. A few of them, such as ^^Indirection'^ and 
^^An Old Man^s Idyl/' entitle him to a definite place among 
minor American poets. 

Among orators of the middle West may be mentioned 
Eobert G. IngersoU (1833-1899). He was born in New 

York, but spent almost his entire life in 
Roberta. Illinois. His best speeches were pleas in 

important cases in which he was counsel, and 
occasional orations, notably his nomination of Blaine in the 
presidential convention of 1876. He attracted most atten- 
tion, however, by his lectures attacking the conventional 
aspects of Christianity. All his speeches show a tendency 
to be flamboyant and over-rhetorical, and in those on reli- 
gious questions he makes use of ridicule and irritating satire. 
He had an effective command of language, but his works will 
always be more highly admired by the sophomore than by 
the maturer mind. 

The West has produced more than its fair proportion of 
popular humorists. Most of these have little literary merit, 

though they cannot quite be ignored. There 
SorSr*^^'' is a distinctly Western quality in the work of 

Henry W. Shaw (1818-1885) which can be 
traced to an experience of twenty years as steamboat hand, 
auctioneer, and Ohio farmer, though he did not become 
famous as ^^Josh Billings^^ until after his return to the East. 
He owed his popularity to short sayings, which usually ex- 



444 American Literature 

pressed commonplace moral truths in an odd way, and were 
made more striking by the cheap device of bad spelling. 
When he attempted a connected discourse he was insufferably 
flat. David Boss Locke (1833-1888), a native of New York 
but long an Ohio newspaper man, wrote the ^Tetroleum 
V. Nasby'^ letters, which were among the most popular po- 
litical satires during the war and reconstruction periods. 
Most of these were published in the ^^Toledo Blade'^ and 
afterward collected in several volumes. They purport to be 
written from Kentucky by an illiterate and morally irre- 
sponsible Democrat. During the exciting years in which 
they appeared they were widely read, and they are said to 
have been greatly enjoyed by President Lincoln. To the 
reader of to-day they seem to be characterized by flatness, 
vulgarity, and an exaggeration too great to be funny. A 
novel entitled A Paper City, and a book of travels, Nasby 
in Exile, are worthless. Edgar W. ISTye (1850-1896), who 
grew to manhood in Wisconsin, and for a time edited a paper 
in Wyoming, wrote sketches over the name "Bill Nye,^^ al- 
ready made famous by Bret Harte. He probably had more 
genius, and certainly more refinement, than either Shaw or 
Locke, but he had less didactic purpose, and his fame is 
likely to be even shorter lived than theirs. 

An incomparably greater humorist was Samuel L. Clemens 
(1835-1910), who seems destined to be remembered by his 
pen name, Mark Twain. He was born at 
Florida, Missouri, where his father, a Vir- 
ginian of good family, had gone after an unsuccessful career 
as lawyer and business man in Kentucky and Tennessee. Most 
of his boyhood was spent in the sleepy slave-holding river 
town of Hannibal, Missouri. His environment and many of 
his adventures are pictured in Tom Sawyer and Huchleherry 
Finn, When he was twelve years of age his father died 
and he was apprenticed to a local printer. Later he went 



The Central Period 445 

East for a year, worked at his trade in New York and Phila- 
delphia, and visited Washington. At the age of twenty-one 
he started to ^^learn the river/' and in less than two years 
was a licensed steamboat pilot on the lower Mississippi. 
The incidents in the first part of Life on the Missis- 
sippi are largely autobiographical, though in the book 
he represents himself as somewhat younger than was 
actually the case. Up to this time he had written nothing of 
importance. Tradition tells of a sensational issue of his 
brother's newspaper which he produced when left in charge, 
and of some unidentified contributions to the "Saturday 
Evening Post.'' While on the river he contributed to a New 
Orleans paper a burlesque on the reminiscent and oracular 
utterances which Captain Sellers, an old pilot, was in the 
habit of publishing over the signature /^Mark Twain." Cap- 
tain Sellers is said to have been so offended that he never 
wrote again. At a later date Clemens had occasion to make 
use of both his real and his pen name. 

At the outbreak of the war the young pilot found his occu- 
pation gone, and after a brief and unimportant experience 

in the Confederate army he went West with 
L^r Career^ ^^^ brother, who had been appointed secretary 

to the territorial governor of Nevada. He saw 
various aspects of life in the West, tried mining, took up a 
timber claim on the shores of Lake Tahoe, and did editorial 
work on a paper at Virginia City, Nevada, and later on the 
"San Francisco Morning Call." In San Francisco he came 
in contact with Bret Harte and others of the interesting 
group who were trying to develop literature on the Pacific 
slope. For a few months he was in the Sandwich islands as 
a newspaper correspondent, and he lectured a little. He had 
already established a local reputation as a humorist, but he 
attracted slight attention until 1867, when The Celebrated 
Jumping Frog of Calaveras was published in a New York 



446 American Literature 

paper. Two years later he was sent by a newspaper on a 
cruise to Southern Europe and the Holy Land — the first, 
apparently, of the Mediterranean tours by chartered steamer 
which are now so common. His newspaper correspond- 
ence written on this trip was worked over into The In- 
nocents Abroad, which appeared in book form in 1869. 
This was printed for the subscription trade, rather showily, 
with crude if sometimes vigorous woodcuts. It achieved a 
large sale, though chiefly among readers who bought litera- 
ture on the solicitations of agents. On his return from his 
first trip abroad he became editor of a paper in Buffalo, New 
York, and in 1871 removed to Hartford, Connecticut. After 
this time he lived in Connecticut and New York, with several 
visits abroad. Shortly before his death Oxford conferred 
on him the degree of D. C. L. Like Scott he was heavily in- 
volved in the failure of a firm that published his own and 
other books, but he lived to pay all debts and to spend his 
last years in comfortable circumstances. 

Mark Twain passed the greater part of his literary life 
in the East, but he was distinctly a product of the West. 

The unpro2^ressive existence in the Missouri 
and th W t community where he spent his boyhood, and 

the free, varied life on the Mississippi in- 
fluenced him profoundly in different ways, and his later 
experiences on the Pacific slope gave just the element that 
was needed to produce a man who was typical of the most 
picturesque parts of the West. It is not quite certain when 
he changed his views on slavery and kindred matters. He was 
of Virginia ancestry^ his own family held slaves, and at the 
outbreak of the war he evidently inclined toward the South. 
Through all his later writings he was unsparing in his con- 
demnation of slavery, both because it was a moral wrong and 
because it repressed the economic and industrial advance- 
lent in which he so thoroughly believed. Mr. Howells says. 



The Central Period 447 

"The part of him that was Western in his Southwestern 
origin Clemens kept to the end, but he was the most de- 
southernized Southerner I ever knew/^ 

Like many humorists Mark Twain showed eccentric and 
contradictory personal traits. Some of these were no doubt 

inborn and others were acquired during the 
P^sonaUr^^ varied experiences of his early years. The 

slow drawl which many persons thought was 
affected for use on the lecture platform is said to have been 
characteristic of his mother's speech as well. His unrepressed 
indulgence in profanity and his habit of using broad lan- 
guage in conyersation and personal letters may have been 
acquired on the river. He had a fondness for striking cos- 
tumes, such as the sealskin coat which caused discomfort to 
his friends as they walked with him on Broadway, and the 
white serge suit which he wore conspicuously in his later 
years ; and he was fond of doing things to surprise and shock 
the conservative public. He was enthusiastic over the prac- 
tical achievements of modern scientists and inventors, though, 
if we are to believe his own statement, he lacked the mechani- 
cal sense necessary to comprehend even the simplest device. A 
more important characteristic was his liability to form intense 
dislikes for persons and institutions. In both his humorous 
and his serious works he occasionally pauses to deliver a 
fling of concentrated bitterness at something which has 
aroused his hatred. In Innocents Abroad he denounces Abe- 
lard. In Tom Sawyer he condemns the sentimentality which 
shows sympathy for criminals. Among his pet literary aver- 
sions was Sir Walter Scott, and with a total disregard of 
chronology he seriously held Scott's romances responsible for 
the false ideals of chivalry and the backward condition of the 
South. 

Mark Twain was the author of many works, not all of 
which need be mentioned here. After The Innocents Abroad 



448 American Literature 

he wrote Roughing It (1872), which tells of his early ex- 
periences in Nevada and California. His sketches of travel 

were continued, at a later date, by A Tramp 
WriuJr^"^'^ 4&road and Following the Equator. In 1873 

he wrote, in collaboration with Charles Dud- 
ley Warner, The Gilded Age. The chief character of this 
story is Colonel Sellers, the delightfully enthusiastic and 
impecunious promoter of great business ventures. Colonel 
Sellers is said to have been drawn from the life after a 
cousin of Clemens^s mother, and the fact that the caricature 
was sympathetic doubtless adds to his charm. A drama- 
tized version of the book, centering around the character 
of Sellers, held the stage for some years. In 1876 ap- 
peared The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and in 1884 the 
companion volume, HucJcleherry Finn. The Prince and the 
Pauper, which was also dramatized, was published in 1882, 
and Life on the Mississippi in 1883. Among other note- 
worthy works were A Connecticut Yanlcee in King Arthur's 
Court, 1889, in which the author keeps up his quarrel with 
feudal ideals, Pudd'nhead Wilson, 1894, another tale of a 
Mississippi Eiver town, Joan of Arc, an historical novel, and 
Christian Science, an attack on the new faith. 

Mark Twain made his first reputation as a humorist. There 
is much that is not funny in The Innocents Abroad, but the 

great majority of readers who bought the inar- 
Mar Twain s ^jg^ic volume from a persuasive agent thought 

of it only as a funny book and the author as 
another American "funny man.^^ In essence the humor is 
of the same sort that had been shown by other newspaper 
writers. There is much exaggeration, some of it less effective 
than statement of fact would have been. The tourist who 
had a napoleon changed for copper in Tangier "had bought 
eleven quarts of coin, and the head of the firm had gone on 
the street to negotiate for the balance of the change.'' There 



The Central Period 449 

is a striving after incongruity — an incongruity often secured 
by treating in a light way things of dignity and importance. 
Gibraltar from the sea is "suggestive of a ^goV of mud on 
the end of a shingle/^ The much quoted meditation at the 
tomb of Adam is not irreverent in the sense that it shocks 
anyone's religious faith; but it shows a disposition to force 
mirth on any subject. Even in these early volumes, however, 
Mark Twain was usually far better than his journalistic 
contemporaries, and in his best work he was incomparably 
above them. He took the so-called "American humor'' — 
the humor of excessive statement and juxtaposition of irrele- 
vant ideas — and showed that in the hands of a literary artist 
it was a form worthy of respect. But in essentials his rela- 
tionships are always with Artemus Ward rather than with 
Oliver Wendell Holmes. 

The humor in Mark Twain's later stories is better than 
that in his earlier works chiefly because it presents a more 
genuine view of life. When at his best he shows a sure in- 
sight into human nature. Compare, on the one hand, the 
meditation at the tomb of Adam or the well-known experience 
with the mummy and the Genoa guide from The Innocents 
Abroad, and on the other hand the chapter in which Tom 
Sawyer whitewashes the fence, or the coarser episode of 
"The Eoyal Nonesuch" from Huchleherry Finn, The two 
selections last named are not more refined or more clever 
than the others, but they rest on a basis of fundamental 
truth that gives them far greater value. 

In his stories, Tom Sawyer, Huchleherry Finn, and 
Pudd'nhead Wilson, and in the first part of Life on the Mis- 
sissippi, Mark Twain pictured the world as 
Mark Twain's he saw it in boyhood and youth. The plots 

River^ Tales ^^ ^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^ somewhat forced. As a critic 

he was merciless in his comments on romantic 

writers, and he attacked Cooper for the improbability of his 



450 American Literature 

incidents. Yet nothing in Cooper is so unlikely as the story 
of Pudd'nhead Wilson, with two Italian noblemen running 
for office in a little Western town, and the discovery after 
many years that slave and master had been exchanged in 
their cradles. It would be ungracious to apply the author's 
criticisms to his own work. In spite of over-ingenuity and 
the use of trite romantic situations, Pudd'nhead Wilson is 
interesting and in parts powerful. Most readers, however, 
prefer the earlier tales, Tom Sawyer and HucTcleherry Finn, 
The first, which as has been said is largely autobiographical, 
has more force, but less unity. It is preeminently a study 
of boy nature, though there is much on other human nature 
as well. Huchleberry Finn is regarded by many critics as 
the author's masterpiece. It is as truly humorous as Tom 
Sawyer, but the underlying view of life is more serious, 
iand it suggests more important questions. Especially interest- 
ing is the implied commentary on slavery. It has more to do 
with the Mississippi, and no one else has presented so strongly 
and sympathetically the elusive fascination of the mighty 
stream. 

It was perhaps the fact that the river affected him so pro- 
foundly that led Mark Twain to rank Life on the Mississippi 

as his best work. Yet it may be that he was 
M^ssi^ssi^^r not far from right. The book contains a few 

of his finest descriptions — passages which, like 
others of almost equal excellence in HucTcleherry Finn, show 
his response to the subtler appeals of nature, and which, if he 
had written no humor, might have given him a reputation 
as a prose poet. No other of his works shows better the power 
and flexibility of his style, and no other has so much diversity 
and is at the same time so well sustained. There is no bois- 
terousness, and there is less fun of any sort than in most of 
his writings, but there is much humor in the true sense of 
that word. These comments apply only to the chapters 



The Central Period 451 

which tell of the author^s experiences before the war. The 
last part of the volume is like disjointed and rather unin- 
teresting newspaper correspondence and the effect of anti- 
climax which it produces is a disappointing reminder of some 
of Mark Twain's artistic deficiencies. 

Of the tales with imaginative and historical settings A 
Connecticut Yanhee in King Arthur's Court is perhaps the 

most notable. Those who rank this work 
Med^^Tal^ among the author's best, point to the abundant 

humor and to the lessons which the story 
teaches — ^the selfishness of feudalism and the service of 
modern science and invention in securing rights to the indi- 
vidual. Those who are less enthusiastic complain that a 
humor based so purely on burlesque and incongruity is more 
forced than that of HucMeberry Finn and Life on the Mis- 
sissippi, and feel that the lessons need no such grotesquely 
elaborate enforcement. The more conservative are likely to 
regret, also, that the good in chivalry should not have a more 
respectful recognition. It is characteristic of Mark Twain that 
while he had only ridicule for the knights who were accustomed 
to "go grailing'' and gather at the Table Eound, he regarded 
Joan of Arc with the most intense admiration and reverence. 
His historical novel, Joan of Arc, purporting to be the me- 
moirs of the Maid as written by her private secretary, is a 
serious piece of work. It shows careful historical reading 
and much pains, but it is not wholly successful or convincing. 
If Mark Twain was taken too lightly at first, he was taken 
seriously, perhaps too seriously, in his later years. Headers 

who discovered that he was something more 
Sioullfipts *^^^ ^ newspaper joker began to hail him as 

a philosopher, and he himself undertook to 
express opinions on a variety of subjects ranging from for- 
eign missions to politics. He attacked Christian Science in 
a volume which is probably more deeply regretted by his 



453 American Literature 

friends who share his disapprobation of the new sect than 

by the victims of his ridicule and scorn. 

It would be unduly rash to predict at this time the future 

place of Mark Twain in American literature. It already 

becomes evident that in his later years and 

Mark Twain s gince his death he has been overrated. Little 
Rank 

of his ambitiously serious work appears to 

have the elements of permanency, and it is probable that 

with change of taste his purely funny writings will seem less 

and less interesting. He has left, however, a considerable 

amount of truly genuine work in which the humor is more 

than cleverness and the seriousness is without affectation; 

and it will be strange if American readers willingly let this 

die. 

Between the Mississippi and the Pacific slope there was 

little literary production worthy of notice. Colorado may 

perhaps lay claim to Mrs. Helen Hunt Jack- 
faSon^^* son (1831-1885). She was the daughter of 

Professor Fiske of Amherst, and was first 
married to Captain Edward B. Hunt of the United States 
army. After the death of her husband and children she be- 
gan to write, and was soon one of the regular contributors 
to the ^^Atlantic.^^ The state of her health induced her to 
remove to Colorado, and here she was later married to Wil- 
liam S. Jackson, of Colorado Springs. About 1879 or 1880 
she became strongly interested in the wrongs of the Indians, 
and from that time many of her writings dealt with various 
aspects of the Indian question. She was a woman of intense 
and thoroughly genuine personality, violent in her likes and 
dislikes, and often, though never intentionally, unjust. One 
of her marked characteristics was a love of wandering, which 
led her to Europe and many times through favorite parts of 
America. Her poems, most of them originally published in 
periodicals, were collected in volumes at various times. Her 



The Central Period 453 

prose included sketches of travel^ literary criticism, fiction, 
stories for children, fend miscellaneous essays. For the 
greater number of her writings she used the signature "H. 
H./^ and later Helen Jackson. The question of her author- 
ship of a series of clever magazine stories signed ^^Saxe 
Holme'^ once aroused much discussion, and was never abso- 
lutely settled. 

Mrs. Jackson^s poems reflect the strong emotions character- 
istic of her nature. They tell old legends of the church, they 
treat of death and religious consolation, of 
wSJr^^''"''^ happy and of unrequited love, and of the de- 
lights of nature. Most of them are short and 
in lyric measures. They are likely to be over-rich in imagery 
and to lack calmness and repose. Much of her prose shows 
the same intensity as her verse. Her early accounts of 
European travel jumble together valuable matter and trivially 
uninteresting personal detail, but some of her later sketches, 
such as ^^Glimpses of California and the Missions,^^ are charm- 
ing in both matter and style. A Century of Dishonor, an ar- 
raignment of the Ilnited States government for its treatment 
of the Indians, was written after conscientious researches in 
the Astor library, but is a one-sided and almost hysterical 
presentation of the subject. As a tract it had an immediate 
effect, but it can hardly add much to the author's permanent 
literary reputation. Her best prose work, Eamona, a story of 
early life in Southern California, also introduces the wrongs 
of the Indians, somewhat to the detriment of the novel as a 
work of art. It abounds in accurate and graphic descriptions, 
sometimes more detailed than is necessary to give local color. 
The plot is simple and not wholly artistic. The study of 
three women in the first part of the book is excellent. The 
author succeeded in portraying the Indian and the Spaniard 
better than less passionate and more complex Anglo-Saxon 
types. The power of the novel is due in part to its intensity 



454 American Literature 

and moral earnestness, in part to the fact that it shows an- 
other of the local and distinctive methods of life in America 
that have been so thoroughly exploited by recent story tellers. 
The Pacific slope, like the Ohio valley, developed a literary 
center of its own which maintained some importance until 

^, ^ .^ «, ^fter the completion of trans-continental rail- 
The Pacific Slope ^ ^^ ^ _.^ . -,. i 

roads. JN ewspapers, literary periodicals, pub- 
lishing houses, and libraries were all founded in San Fran- 
cisco soon after the American occupation of California. Be- 
tween 1850 and 1856 at least three literary magazines were 
started in the city. More important was the ^^Overland 
Monthly,'^ founded in 1868. This was ambitiously modelled 
after the ^^Atlantic,^^ and though of course very provincial, 
had some merit. Many of the articles dealt with Western sub- 
jects, but there was also a brave attempt to be cosmopolitan. 
The contributors to this as to earlier magazines were mostly 
men of Eastern birth, some of them only temporarily resi- 
dent in California. 

The most distinctive of the California writers was Francis 
Bret Harte (1839-1902), who after he achieved literary suc- 
cess wrote over the shortened signature of 
Bret Harte. He was born in Albany, New 
York, and received a common school education. His father 
died while he was still young, and at the age of fifteen he 
went with his mother to California. He taught school and 
worked as miner, tax-collector, express messenger, drug 
clerk, and compositor — all before he was twenty years of age. 
He contributed to the ^^Californian,^^ a literary weekly that 
preceded the ^^Overland,^^ and as early as 1863 published a 
Spanish-American tale in the ^^Atlantic.^^ When the ^^Over- 
land Monthly^^ was founded he became its editor, and in 
the second issue brought out ^The Luck of Eoaring Camp,'^ 
his first great success. This was quickly followed by "The 
Outcasts of Poker Flat'^ and several other of his best tales. 



^HE Centeal Period 455 

and by some of his most popular poems, among them ^Tlain 
Language from Truthful James/^ better known as "The 
Heathen Chinee/^ These were more highly valued in the 
East than in California, and in 1871 the author resigned his 
editorship and the professorship of English literature in the 
University of California to which he had just been elected, and 
removed to New York. He contributed to the "Atlantic'' and 
lectured in various parts of the country. In 1878 he was ap- 
pointed consul at Crefeld, Germany, and two years later was 
transferred to Glasgow. After his removal from the latter 
position in 1885 he continued to reside in England until 
his death. His works include Condensed Novels, 1867; The 
Luch of Roaring Camp and other STcetches, 1871; Tales of 
the Argonauts and other Sketches, 1875 ; and many other col- 
lections of short tales; Qahriel Conroy, a novel, 1876; Two 
Men of Sandy Bar, a drama, 1876; and several collections 
of poems, the first published in 1871. 

Bret Harte had some conspicuous personal peculiarities 
which were freely commented upon during his life time, and 
not even the work of his latest biographer has 

Personality 



Bret Harte s made it possible to form a sure estimate of his 



character. He is said to have been unreliable 
in keeping dinner engagements, paying debts, and attend- 
ing to consular duties. During his later years there was 
some estrangement between him and his family. On the 
other hand published letters to his wife and children are 
charming and apparently genuine. He was welcome in 
literary and the better social circles of England, and formed 
warm friendships with Englishmen. He enjoyed children 
and won their confidence. It seems probable that he suffered 
from a lack of business aptitude, and of firmness of charac- 
ter, so that without any serious moral delinquencies he alien- 
ated some friends and gave his enemies opportunity for 
malicious attacks. 



456 American Literature 

Life in California in the early fifties was unique. The 

discovery of gold had attracted great crowds of adventurers, 

representative of all parts of America and 

CaUfomian Life -^^^^P^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ grades of society and all 
degrees of education. Their one common 
characteristic was intense energy; and in the free atmos- 
phere of a new country they were boisterous and unrestrained, 
even to the point of lawlessness. In contrast to the rawness 
of this society were the remains of the old, drowsy, Spanish 
civilization. Still other elements of picturesqueness were 
added by the Indians and the Chinese. Bret Harte seems 
to have been greatly impressed by this heterogeneous life as 
he saw it during the varied experiences of his early years. 
His first sketch in the ^^Atlantic,^^ published 
Bret Harte's {^^ i863, tells an old Spanish tradition in a 
Tales of x i • i t • t^- 

California Life ^^^^ ^^^ Irvmgesque manner. Five years 

later, in "The Luck of Eoaring Camp,'^ and 
the stories that immediately followed it, he turned to the 
portrayal of rude life in the mining camp. These early short 
sketches are his best work. They copy some of the less ad- 
mirable traits of Dickens; they are over-sentimental and 
somewhat sensational; the conclusions, even in the best 
stories like "The Outcasts of Poker Plat,^^ are inartistically 
melodramatic. Nevertheless, they are characterized by indi- 
viduality, humor, wide sympathy, and truth to the ultimate 
facts of human nature. If they serve any didactic purpose 
it is to show that there are some elements of gentleness and 
goodness in the roughest men and the lowest social outcasts. 
The heroes and the heroines are often vicious characters, but 
the author always distinguishes sharply between their heroic 
qualities and their vices. 

After he went abroad Bret Harte continued to write stories 
of the early life in California. His admirers point out now 
one and now another of these later sketches as evidence that 



The Central Period 457 

♦ 

his powers had not diminished, but none of these is convinc- 
ing to the average reader. He had been too long away from 

the scenes that he described; he had lost too 
L t T 1 ^ niuch of his early idealism and enthusiasm and 

he had come too much under the influence 
of the conventional in literature. He often took the stock plots 
of the ordinary story writer and developed them with a Cali- 
fornia setting that was also becoming formal. He yielded 
to the latter-day temptation to character analysis, and in 
this he was unsuccessful. Some of the characters of his 
earlier stories, such as Oakhurst and Yuba Bill, really live, 
and Colonel Starbottle is at least an interesting caricature; 
but even these persons, when he elaborated them in later 
works, become incomprehensible beings. He had most difficulty 
in portraying women, and this he rashly undertook in many 
of the later tales. His few sketches of a more refined civi- 
lization are even less successful than the later Western stories, 
and this fact offers the justification for his persistent ad- 
herence to the earlier form of work. 

The prose other than the short stories is of less importance. 
The two series of Condensed Novels, one among the earliest 

and the other among the latest of his writ- 
Bret Harte's ings, are at times clever in their parodies 
Miscellaneous « , r, .. i i .i i 

^Q^y^ 01 contemporary fiction, but the cleverness 

is on the whole specious. The longer stories, 
especially the novel Gabriel Convoy, are failures. The author 
could no more organize a complex plot than he could analyze 
a complex character. The same deficiencies led to the failure 
of his prose drama, ^^Two Men of Sandy Bar.^^ In this 
some of the scenes are so far over-done that they seem like 
burlesque ; and the story is confused, improbable, and fails 
to satisfy a sense of poetic justice. 

Though not a great poet Harte was a verse writer of con- 
siderable merit. He handled a variety of lyric measures with 



458 American Literature 

success. He managed the "dramatic monologue'^ with a 
great deal of naturalness; and he was able to write dialect 

verse that was humorous without being cheap, 
ret ar e s j^ j^ perhaps his humorous poems like "The 

Heathen Chinee'^ and "The Society upon 
the Stanislaus^^ that are best known; but some of the senti- 
mental and mildly pathetic pieces like "Her Letter'^ and 
"Dickens in Camp^^ are almost as popular. "Jim/^ his best 
dramatic monologue, blends humor and pathos. His patri- 
otic and some of his juvenile poems are smooth and effective. 
Little of his work is distinctly imitative, but there are sug- 
gestions of divers poets, among them Longfellow, Emerson, 
and Browning. 

Bret Harte is said to have been fastidious in matters of 
diction and to have spared no pains to secure the proper 

word and phrase. He lacked somewhat, how- 
Bret Harte s QYeVy in sense for style ; and his style did not 

improve with years. Yet in spite of all 
artistic defects some of his work is too strong and too genuine 
to be lost. In his lifetime he probably did not receive due 
recognition at home. At first California resented his sketches 
and feared that the East would accept them as a complete 
picture of Western civilization. Later the East, which had 
welcomed him, grew sensitive lest the vogue of his books 
abroad might give Englishmen a wrong idea of America. 
It now seems that he is assured of a permanent place among 
American story writers, though the amount of work for which 
he will ultimately be remembered may be small. 

The most gifted California writer of a slightly later date 
was Edward Eowland Sill (1841-1887). He was born in 

Connecticut and was graduated at Yale. 

Rowland SiU ^^^^ ^^^^ ^^ "^^^^ ^^ ^^® engaged in busi- 
ness on the Pacific coast. He then returned 
East, studied a few months in Harvard divinity school, did 



The Central Period 459 

editorial work on a Kew York paper, and taught in an Ohio 
academy. From 1871 to 1874 he was instructor in the Oak- 
land, California, high school, and from 1874 to 1882 was 
professor of English literature in the University of Cali- 
fornia. The last four years of his life were spent in Ohio, 
where he was engaged in literary work. His writings were 
contributed to the magazines, especially to the ^^Atlantic 
Monthly,^^ and most of them were published anonymously. 
The only volumes issued in his lifetime were a small collec- 
tion of poems published in 1867, and another privately 
printed for his friends when he left California in 1883. 
Since his death there have been published three small volumes 
of his poems, and a volume of prose, all, or almost all, 
gathered from the magazines. 

Sill was a New England idealist who never succeeded in 
putting his mind at rest regarding the problems and doubts 
which the nineteenth century brought to thinking men. His 
poems present, not doubt overcome by faith, as in Tennyson, 
nor doubt accepted with a resignation that becomes half 
pleasurable, as in Arnold, but the real doubt of a sensitive 
and conscientious man who continues to question the uni- 
verse. They are individual poems, and reveal a personality 
of great sweetness, naturalness, and human sympathy. His 
best known ^hort poem, ^^A FooPs Prayer,^^ has an epigram- 
matic quality. ^^The Venus of Milo,^^ his best poem of mod- 
erate length, blends with the spirit of the later nineteenth 
century something of the spirit of Keats. "The Hermitage,'^ 
his longest poem, has some fine passages and much micro- 
scopic description of nature, but taken as a whole is not 
strong. His prose, which is mostly in the form of brief 
essays, has the same charm as his poetry, and sometimes a 
lightness that most of the poetry lacks. His limitations in 
both prose and verse are obvious, but he will continue to at- 
tract a small circle of persons whose intellectual experiences 



460 



American Literature 



fit them to uiiderstand his own, and who read him closely 
enough to come in sympathy with his fine personality. 

Of living writers in California who attained a reputation 
before 1883, Cincinnatus Hiner Miller, who writes as 
"Joaquin Miller/^ is the most distinctive. He 
has written prose fiction, but is known 
especially for his vigorous verse. Miss Ina 
D. Coolbrith has written poems, the best of 



Living 

California 

Writers 



them lyrical. 



CHAPTER V 

Eecent Years (1883-1912) 

A WORK which does not consider living authors in detail 
can give little more than a general discussion of the literary 
achievements of the last thirty years. Besides the survivors 
from the earlier time, whose work has been discussed in the 
preceding chapter, there have arisen many American writers 
of merit, but few of obvious distinction. Periods of medi- 
ocrity are likely to intervene between major creative periods, 
and it may be that the next generation will see great and 
original achievement; but the signs of the new time are not 
yet sufficiently plain to justify prophecy. 

An important phenomenon of the last twenty-five years has 

been the loss of literary prestige by New England, without 

the corresponding development of any other 

lLSS^cS lit^^^^y ^e^t^^- Boston is still the seat of 
important educational and publishing inter- 
ests, and the home of much culture. New York, as the chief 
commercial center, leads in the magazine and book publish- 
ing industries, and offers the greatest attractions to those 
who. are interested in the drama and other arts. But though 
the majority of American writers visit New York, contribute 
to New York magazines, and publish with New York houses, 
no great proportion of them live in the city, and there is no 
very distinctive New York school of writers. Other cities, 
notably Philadelphia and Chicago, have literary interests of 
importance. The tendency seems to be, however, to concen- 
trate publishing in the East, especially in New York, but to 
leave authors scattered throughout the country. This is u 

461 



463 American Literature 

natural result of modern means of communication, and the 
modern dissemination of books. Diversity of residence and 
ease of communication make possible the expression of minor 
sectional traits, and at the same time an increase in the homo- 
geneity of national literature. 

Another interesting fact is the development of periodicals 
in such a way as to change the relation between author and 

reader. In an earlier day magazines were sup- 
Changes m ported directly by their readers, and could pay 
Magazines ^ . . . . 

their contributors only in proportion to the 

amount received from subscriptions. In commercial phrase, 
the magazine stood in the position of middleman between 
the producer and the consumer of literature. With the devel- 
opment of modern business methods magazines are supported 
by advertising, and in some cases subscriptions form a rela- 
tively small source of income. The manager may care for a 
large circulation more on account of the greater advantages 
in advertising contracts than on account of the money received 
from the sale of copies. He is in danger of regarding the 
literary contents as in itself an advertising feature, and of 
choosing contributors for their advertising value. It is true 
that all magazine editors are on the alert for the desirable 
work of any new author; but it is also true that many of 
them are willing to pay a popular writer his own price for 
anything, good or bad, that bears his name. As a result 
authors of established reputation are sorely tempted to allow 
the publication of hasty and ill considered works. More 
serious is the fact that even the better magazines are forced 
by competition to supply novelties, and to accept material 
that is striking and speciously attractive, rather than that 
which is sound. Since a much larger proportion of writings 
than ever before are first published in magazines, these facts 
are of serious importance. 
Modem processes of illustration also influence writings in- 



Eecent Years 463 

tended for magazines, and to a lesser extent those published 
in books. They have already revolutionized the literature of 
travel; so that the up-to-date traveller's narrative is no 
longer a series of graphic descriptions and interesting inci- 
dents, but a thin letter-press commentary on the work of 
his camera, or maybe of his brush and pencil. It is hard to 
believe, too, that some of the stories published by magazines 
are not accepted because they lend themselves to illustration 
rather than for their literary qualities. 

These changed conditions are by no means unmixed evils; 
nor are their concomitants, the middleman between author 
and publisher, and the syndicate of periodicals. They do, 
however, affect the circumstances of publication so seriously 
that they must affect the method and quality of literary pro- 
duction. Whether the sum of their influences is for good 
or for bad it is now too soon to say. 

It is in accordance with the spirit of the time that recent 

tendencies in novel writing are in the direction of realism 

and character analysis. There have been oc- 

endency casional violent reactions in the direction of 

Toward Realism 

ultra-romanticism, and about the close of the 

century the country suffered from an epidemic of hastily 
written historical novels. The two most distinguished living 
American novelists, William Dean Howells and Henry James, 
stand, however, for the study and portrayal of things as they 
are. 

In the recent development of the short story as a distinct 
literary form America has done its full share, and more; 
and perhaps American writers of short stories 
are relatively more distinguished than Ameri- 
can authors in any other field of literature. The increasing 
number of magazines offers opportunities for the publication 
of short stories, and short stories in turn help to make the 
magazines possible and popular. Many young persons with 



464 American Literature 

literary interests have found time to attempt the briefer 
form when circumstances would have prevented them from 
writing an old-fashioned two volume novel; and though this 
has led to the production of an immense amount of experi- 
mental and mediocre work, it has developed a few writers 
who might not otherwise have discovered their capabilities. 
During the last few years the short story has come to be re- 
garded as a worthy form of fiction with laws of its own, and 
its technique is now being studied by many critics. A notable 
characteristic of recent short story writing in America is the 
use of ^^local color/^ Almost every distinctive community and 
mode of life in the country has been exploited by story 
tellers. Among the many writers who have made special 
fields their own are Sarah Orne Jewett and Mary E. Wilkins 
Freeman for New England, George W. Cable for the Louisi- 
ana Creoles, Mary M. Murfree (Charles Egbert Craddock) 
for the Tennessee mountains, F. Hopkinson Smith for some 
aspects of the South, Thomas Nelson Page and Joel Chandler 
Harris for the Southern Aegro, James Lan^ Allen for Ken- 
tucky, Hamlin Garland and Owen Wister for certain features 
of life in the middle West and the Southwest, respectively. 
Not only different sections of the country, but occupations 
which have distinctive peculiarities :are drawn upon for set- 
tings for short stories. 

The V'aluable achievement of the last quarter-century in 
poetry has been small. The best work has been done by 

_ writers who made their reputation before 

Poetry . 

1883. The fashion has set toward short and 

epigrammatic lyrics, and few poems on an ambitious scale 
have been attempted. The Americans who have had most 
influence on their latest successors are Emerson and Whit- 
man. There are many experiments in the manner of Euro- 
pean poets and of other times, but there is little that seems 
a high and genuine expression of to-day. 



Eecent Years 465 

An increasing number of younger men have been tempted 
to the writing of plays^ and some of them have produced 
work admirably suited to effective presenta- 
tion by the complex art of the modern stage. 
There have, however, been no dramas of the first literary rank, 
and few of the second. The perpetual demand for sensa- 
tional plays has been filled by melodramas which stage-craft 
is able to make more lurid than ever before ; but the tendency 
in the drama, as in prose fiction, is toward realism. It may 
be partly as a result of that tendency that the successful act- 
ing plays written within the last few years have been almost 
all in prose. 

Within recent years there have been many writers of good 
prose essays, but none of preeminent distinction. The sharp 
differentiation of - the short story from the 
essay has modified the latter, and no recent 
writings are of the same order as some of the most charming 
work" of Addison, Lamb, and Irving. Essays on various 
aspects of nature-study have become popular, and discussions 
of literary and artistic matters are more widely read than ever 
before. In the better newspapers lighter discussions of social 
questions and of evils of the day have been more refined :and 
more truly humorous than formerly. Though these can 
hardly be classed as literature their improvement indicates 
better popular taste. 

With the development of modern ideals of scholarship the 
writings of scholars take less and less rank [as literature. 
Thoroughness of investigation and imparti- 
ality of statement are the chief merits of the 
monograph or treatise; and many investigators seem to fear 
that literary graces are to be shunned lest they seduce the 
writer from accuracy in the presentation of facts. For this 
reason few of the m^ny able scientists and historians of 
recent years need be mentioned in this volume. 



466 American Literature 

On account of the increased homogeneity of the country 
and the great frequency of migrations, classification of au- 
thors according to location is less easy and far 
Writers^^ ^ ^^^^ significant in this period than in those that 
have preceded. In New England, where the lit- 
erary life has fortunately been conducive to longevity, Edward 
Everett Hale, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Julia Ward 
Howe, J. T. Trowbridge, and Donald G. Mitchell, all contribu- 
tors to the ^^^Atlantic^^ in its early days, continued to write un- 
til well into the twentieth century ; and so did Harriet Prescott 
Spoflord, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward, and Thomas Bailey 
Aldrich, slightly younger members of the ^^Atlantic^' group. 
Among surviving writers who entered the field later are 
Julia C. E. Dorr, of Vermont, who has written popular verse, 
Arthur Sherburne Hardy, of New Hampshire, who has pub- 
lished several novels and miscellaneous essays, and Mary E. 
Wilkins Freeman, of Massachusetts, who has written short 
stories. Winston Churchill, one of the most popular of later 
novelists, lives in New Hampshire. Margaret W. Deland, poet 
and novelist, has been a resident of Boston since 1880, though 
she was a native of Pennsylvania. The relative importance 
of women in the literary life of New England is an interest- 
ing fact. 

One of the most interesting writers of verse who no longer 
survives is Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), who was born and 

spent her life in Amherst, Massachusetts. 
Emily Dickinson ^, , « ^ • i 

^ Though a woman of grace and social accom- 

plishment she voluntarily lived almost as a recluse. Only 
three or four of her poems were published during her life- 
time, and not even her closest friends realized her power, or 
knew of the amount of excellent work that she was storing 
away in her portfolio. The three little volumes of verse pub- 
lished after her death abound in short startling bits of self- 
revelation and incisive comments on life. Though uneven, 



Eecent Years 467 

as secret poetical work is almost sure to be, they sliow un- 
questionable genius. The author had humor, insight, and 
an unusual power of terse and well rounded expression. Her 
Letters are interesting, but are disappointing in that they 
give so little clue to her personality. 

Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909) began to write before 
1883, though most of her work was done later. She was a 

descendant of old and cultured New England 
T tt ^^^ families, and was born at South Berwick, 

Maine, where her father was a doctor with a 
large country practice. As a member of a physician's family 
Miss Jewett had an exceptional opportunity to know inti- 
mately the lives of persons of all social grades. During her 
early womanhood the summer boarder was beginning to 
frequent the vicinity of South Berwick, and it was with a 
kindly hope of interpreting her humbler neighbors to these 
visitors that she began to write. Her first sketches were 
printed in the "Atlantic Monthly.^^ Deephaven, her first novel, 
appeared in 1877, but is said to have b^en written earlier. 
After the publication of Deephaven she continued to write 
abundantly, producing a novel or a volume of short stories 
almost every year. Most of her work portrays New England 
life, and she is at her best in the representation of placid 
existence in a manner that frequently invites comparisons 
with Cranford. The Country of the Pointed Firs is prob- 
ably her best novel. 

Constance Fenimore Woolson (1838-1894), a niece of 
James Fenimore Cooper, illustrates the migratory tendency 

that makes geographical grouping of authors 
Constance difficult. She was born in New Hampshire, 

Woolson ^^^ educated in Cleveland and New York 

city, for several years spent her winters in 
Florida, and after 1879 lived mostly in Italy. She fairly 
belongs, however, to New Hampshire. She began to write 



468 American Literature 

fiction about 1870 and continued until her death. Most of 
her work, which consisted of both short stories and novels, was 
first published in ^^Harper's Magazine/^ and much of it was 
afterward reprinted in book form. She is distinguished from 
the mass ♦of magazine short story writers by her close obser- 
vation and careful workmanship, but she hardly had genius. 
New York has attracted a large number of writers, many 
of whom are or have been connected with literary periodicals. 

Possibly this association with journalism may 
W^te s ^^^^ encouraged the tendency to mild Bo- 

hemianism which many of them have shown 
or affected. No single characteristic, not even Bohemianism, 
is, however, common to them all. There is really no later 
New York school, 

Henry Cuyler Bunner (1855-1896) was a native of Oswego, 
New York, but passed all his life after early manhood in the 

city. From 1877 until his death he was 
J^^^^^y^®^ editor of ^Tuck,^^ and expended much 

of his energy in the difficult task of seri- 
ously influencing public opinion through the editorial 
articles of a comic paper. He also wrote stories [and 
verses which prove his good humor ;and cleverness and which 
show a deft literary touch. Among his prose volumes are 
Short Sixes, 1890; Zadoc Pine and other Stories, 1891; 
Love in Old Cloathes and other Stories, 1896; the longer 
Story of a 'New Yorlc House, 1887, and Made in France, a 
volume of translations, 1893. There is humor in all of these, 
though they are by no means "funny stories.^^ The best of 
them are charmingly told. Two volumes of verse. Airs from 
Arcady and Rowen, appeared during the author's lifetime, 
and after his death a collection of his poems. He is best in 
parody of the finer sort and in society verse. Some of his 
more delicate lyrics show the influence of Herrick and per- 
haps of Austin Dobson. 



Recent Iears 469 

Laurence Hutton (1843-1904) was a native of New York 
city, and though he travelled much abroad and during his 

latest years lived at Princeton, New Jersey, 
H ^ton^^ was always associated with the literary life of 

the metropolis. For a number of years he 
conducted the department of ^^Literary Notes'^ in "Harper's 
Magazine,^^ he contributed to other periodicals, and he is 
said to have written or edited nearly fifty volumes. His chief 
interests were in literature and the stage. Many of his 
books deal with actors and the theatre, others are literary 
reminiscence and minor criticism. His Literary LandmarTcs 
of London, a carefully prepared guide to places of literary 
interest, was followed by similar volumes on Edinburgh, Paris, 
and other cities. He had an attractive personality, and his 
writings were pleasant reading to his contemporaries; but 
his more ambitious works hardly show the scholarship that 
will make them last, and his lighter prose is too informal to 
survive the traditions of the man himself. 

Francis Eichard Stockton (1834-1902), who wrote as 
Frank E. Stockton, was born in Philadelphia and began 

journalistic work in that city, but during most 
g^^~ of his literary career was connected with 

"Scribner's Monthly^' and "St. Nicholas'^ 
in New York. His reputation was achieved rather late in life. 
He published a volume of stories in 1870, but it was not until 
some years later that the "Eudder Grange^^ gi'oup, and 
especially "The Lady or the Tiger,'^ brought him general rec- 
ognition. He wrote voluminously, :and during the last thirty 
years of his life published more than forty volumes. He 
was a quiet humorist of the ingenious and quizzical order, and 
was most successful in portraying with apparent seriousness 
unusual or impossible situations. "The Lady or the Tiger,'' 
his best known story, is a new type of hoax. He is likely 
to be remembered chiefly for this and for a few more of his 



470 American Literature 

best short stories. His novels, The Late Mrs, Null, The 
Hundredth Man, and others, several collections of juvenile 
tales, and such compilations as Stories of New Jersey and 
Buccaneers and Pirates of our Coasts are respectable work, 
but have little enduring quality. 

Among essayists and miscellaneous writers still living in 
New York, or closely connected with the city, are Lyman 

Abbott, whose chief interest is in religious and 
Y ^W^r sociological questions; Henry van Dyke, now 

of Princeton University, preacher, poet, and 
essayist ; John Burroughs, who writes on the study of nature ; 
and Hamilton W. Mabie, Brander Matthews, and George E. 
Woodberry, who discuss questions of literature. Professors 
Matthews and Woodberry are also known as writers of verse, 
and Professor Matthews has written clever short stories. 
Theodore. Roosevelt has written on a variety of topics, espe- 
cially history and manly sports. William Winter has writ- 
ten important dramatic criticisms. Edith Wharton, one of 
the latest writers of prose fiction, was born in New York and 
her literary associations are chiefly with this city. Among 
New York writers should also be mentioned Francis Hop- 
kinson Smith, author of many delightful stories, though by 
birth and temperament he belongs with the South. Henry 
James, the most distinguished American novelist resident 
abroad, has his chief American associations with New York. 
Mr. James has created the ^^international noveV^ in which 
he represents a cosmopolitan group of characters, each some- 
what at loss to understand the other^s points of view. 

This is perhaps the best place to notice Francis Marion 
Crawford (1854-1909), whose literary relationships, at least 

in a business way, were also with New York. 
Crawford^ Though he spent most of his life abroad he 

was of the purest American ancestry. He was 
descended from General Francis Marion of Eevolutionary 



Eecent Years 471 

fame, and his father was a noted American sculptor. His 
mother was a sister of Julia Ward Howe. He was bom in 
Italy and remained there until his twelfth year. He received 
part of his preparatory schooling at Concord, Massachusetts ; 
attended in turn the Universities of Cambridge, Heidelberg, 
and Eome ; visited India, whither he was drawn by his inter- 
est in Sanscrit; and returned for a time to America, where he 
studied at Harvard and began his literary career. He soon 
went abroad again and lived most of the time in Italy. Dur- 
ing the later years of his life he owned a villa overlooking the 
sea at Sorrento. 

Crawford gained some acquaintance with journalism in 
India, but his first serious writing was done while he was at 

Harvard. Mr. Isaacs, which appeared in 1883 
^awfords ^^^ attracted great attention, was a story of 

the East Indian life which still had a strong 
hold on his imagination. From this time he wrote incessantly 
until his death. Hardly a year went by without its volume 
from his pen, and some years yielded two or more. This 
rapidity could hardly be conducive to the most finished work- 
manship, though it must be owned that his stories rarely 
show obvious marks of haste. He attempted a few stories 
with American settings, but after Mr. Isaacs the scenes of his 
best tales were laid in Europe. A Cigarette-Maher's Ro- 
mance, one of the most finished of his shorter novels, is a 
story of Eussian exiles in Munich. The action of many of 
his most popular stories takes place, naturally, in Italy. 
Among these Italian tales are A Roman Singer, Saracinesca, 
Sanf liario, and Don Orsino, the last three forming a trilogy 
which traces the fortunes of a group of Eoman characters 
during the troubled times after the fall of the papal power. 
All his books are readable ; and it would be difficult to choose 
a restricted list of the best to which his admirers would agree. 
Besides fiction he wrote some popular historical works, 



472 American Literature 

Rulers of the South, Ave Roma Immortalis, and Salve 
Venetiaj and an interesting essay, "The Novel — ^What Is It ?'^ 

In the essay just named Crawford defined the novel as 
a "pocket theatre/^ and took his stand firmly with the 
romanticists as opposed to the realists. His 
of^ Fiction^ ^^^ plots are, indeed, romantic ; and his characters 
are unusual in either personality or situation ; 
but every character acts from comprehensible motives, and 
the backgrounds of his stories are pictured with the greatest 
accuracy of detail. He was a keen observer, and he had the 
interest in arts and crafts and the manual dexterity in irias- 
tering them that was once considered an American trait. He 
could picture a cobbler^s shop or a cigarette maker's workroom 
as accurately as the scenes of higher life. He also succeeded 
as few men do in being really cosmopolitan, so that even 
the citizens of the various countries where he placed his 
plots bear witness that he had actually entered into their 
life, and for the time being looked from their point of view. 
He was, too, a born story teller, who never let the peculiarities 
of his characters or the vividness of his backgrounds obscure 
the interest in the story itself. As a result his characters, 
even the most romantic of them, seem to live, and the action 
of his novels leaves an impression of reality which is more 
lasting than that of most romantic stories. 

Marion Crawford was not a great novelist, but he ranked 
very high among writers of clean, genuine, interesting tales. 
With perhaps one exception he is the most cosmopolitan of 
American writers. His style, notwithstanding his hasty 
composition, is always clear and dignified. 

Considerably younger than most of the men already named 

were Eichard Hovey, Stephen Crane, :and Paul Leicester 

Ford. Eichard Hovey (1864-1900) was born 

ovey ^^ Illinois, was graduated at Dartmouth, and 

after studying for the ministry changed his plans and became 



Eecent Years 473 

journalist, :actor, and finally professor of English literature 
in Barnard college. His poems are varied in form and kind; 
they show such diverse influences as Whitman, Emerson, 
Kipling, and the later French poets, and they attempt many 
Greek and other unusual metres. His most ambitious work 
was Launcelot and Guenevere, a Poem in Dramas, of which 
he published four parts, ^^The Quest of Merlin, a Masque ;^^ 
^^The Marriage of Guenevere, a Tragedy ;^^ ^^The Birth of 
Galahad, a Eomantic Drama ;^^ and ^^Taliesin, a Masque/^ 
The last of these is a mystical allegory of the poet in his 
relation to life, and has some lyrics that are almost fine, 
though they never quite sing themselves. In the earlier parts, 
especially, there is often a conscious striving and a lack of 
perfect touch and taste. In moral tone the poem represents 
the reaction against the exaltation of the domestic virtues 
in the Idyls of the King, and Launcelot is made the chief 
hero. The admirers of the poet ranked Launcelot and 
Guenevere high, and it is certainly a work of promise. If 
Hovey had lived he might have done better things on the 
grand scale. As it is, his best work is probably some of 
his less ambitious lyrics, many of which appeared in Songs 
from Yagahondia, which he published jointly with his friend 
Bliss Carman. As the title of this volume implies, his 
lighter verses have freedom and something of Bohemianism, 
but it is the Bohemianism of the open air rather than that 
of the city beer cellar. At the time of the Spanish- American 
war Hovey wrote several patriotic pieces, of which "Unmani- 
fest Destiny'^ is the best. 

Stephen Cr^e (1871-1900) attended Lafayette college 
and Syracuse university, and served as war correspondent 
during the Grseco-Turkish and the Spanish- 
American wars. For the last two years of his 
life he made his home in England. His stories, especially 
^The Eed Badge of Courage,^^ attracted great attention. 



474 American Literature 

especially in England, where they won high praise from con- 
servative critics. Since his death his reputation has faded 
and it is doubtful if it will be revived. He had the reporter's 
knack of seeing the striking fact and stating it in the pic- 
turesque way, and he had something of the literary artist's 
technique and sense of form ; but his work lacked repose and 
perfect taste. His poems, some of which appeared in a 
volume. War is Kind, show the influence of Whitman. 

Paul Leicester Ford (1865-1902), a native of Brooklyn, 
besides important work as editor, biographer, and bibliogra- 
pher, wrote several novels. Among these were 
Pauj Leicester j.^^ Honorahle Peter Stirling, The Great K. 
and A, Train Robbery, and Janice Meredith. 
The last, a story of the Eevolution, is a conscientious his- 
torical novel, and appeared in 1899, just as this class of fic- 
tion was temporarily in vogue. The Honorable Peter Stirling 
was obviously based on facts in the life of Grover Cleveland. 
In spite of glaring faults in both style and construction it is 
a graphic, realistic story and will remain as a valuable study 
of some aspects of American life. 

During recent years as in the past Philadelphia has main- 
tained publishing interests of importance, and has been a 
center of quiet, conservative culture. Among 
iladep la living authors associated with the city are Dr, 
Silas Weir Mitchell, author of several novels 
and poems, as well as technical and semi-technical works; 
Owen Wister, whose best work in fiction deals with the West 
and the Southwest; Agnes Eepplier, the author of many sug- 
gestive essays, and Horace Howard Furness, the Shake- 
spearean scholar. 

Since the trials and uncertainties of the reconstruction'' 
period Southerners have turned to literature as never before. 
The greater number of Southern authors have written fiction, 
especially stories which portray aspects of provincial life 



Recent Years 475 

with which they are familiar; but the South has produced, 
during the last twenty-five years, at least its fair share of 

workers in all departments of literature. 
The South -g^^^ ^^^ ^^Atlantic Monthly^^ was for a time in 

editorial charge of a man of Southern birth. Most of these 
writers are still living and can only be mentioned here; but 
when the future history of American literature is written this 
infusion of the Southern element is sure to give the material 
for an interesting and instructive chapter. 

In Maryland Richard Malcolm Johnston (1822-1898), a 
native of Georgia and long the head of a boys' school near 

Baltimore, was the author of some excellent 
Maryland ^ short stories. He was nearly sixty years of 

Writers ^ ^S^ before he wrote much, but he gained his 

greatest success in portraying the ^^cracker'^ 
life of Georgia which he had known in his youth. Several 
of the best of the Georgia stories were grouped together as 
The Duheshorough Tales, John B. Tabb (1845-1909), a 
native of Virginia and long instructor in English literature 
in a Roman Catholic college near Baltimore, was the author of 
many quatrains, sonnets, and other brief lyrics. Father 
Tahb's range was narrow, but his exquisite bits of ver«se show 
a genuineness of feeling and a perfection of form that has 
rarely been equalled by minor American poets. Maurice 
Francis Egan, of Washington, author of many tales and 
essays, still survives. Thomas Nelson Page, of Virginia, still 
writes delightful stories, in the best of which the oldtime 
darkey is a prominent character. 

In Georgia Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908) wrote tales 
based on the folklore of the negroes. As a boy he learned the 
printer's trade in the office of a literary periodical published 
by a wealthy Georgia planter on his estate, and here when 
his work was over he listened to the superstitious stories of 
the slaves. Later, when he was on the editorial staff of the 



476 American Literature 

^^^Atlanta Constitution/^ he created the character of Uncle 
Eemus^ an old-fashioned negro into whose mouth he put his 

tales. These early Uncle Eemus sketches were 
Georgia Writers unique, and they are among the most inter- 
Harris esting and valuable contributions of the 

South to national literature. Like many 
newspaper writers who attain great popularity Harris 
worked too fast, and is said to have published twenty-six 
volumes of different sorts between 1880 and 1897, besides 
performing his editorial duties during that time. Much 
of this work is relatively unimportant; and even the later 
Uncle Eemus stories are inferior to their predecessors, partly, 
perhaps, because the author tried to make them more ac- 
curately representative of real negro folklore. As illustrative 
of a different phase of Southern development mention should 
perhaps be made of Henry W. Grady (1850-1889), a native 
of Georgia, a graduate of the University of Georgia, and for 
some time editor of the ^^Atlanta Constitution.^^ Though 
none of his work is likely to live as literature he is one of the 
best illustrations of the development of new and promising 
intellectual tendencies in the section which he represented. 

The Western and Southwestern states of the Old South 
have also had their share of writers. Among those still living 

is Mary N. Murfree, of Tennessee, who writes 
Writer'*^''' over the name of Charles Egbert Craddock. 

Her work consists largely of the portrayal, in 
short stories, of life in the less progressive regions of her 
state. Another writer of short stories, Frances Hodgson Bur- 
nett, is a native of England, but for some time resided in 
Tennessee, and may fairly be assigned to that state. In 
Louisiana George W. Cable has effectively portrayed Creole 
life in novels and short tales. 

It is doubtful whether Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) can 
fairly be claimed as an American writer; yet he lived for 



Recent Years 477 

some time in New Orleans, and it is probable that it was 
here that he developed his individual style; and he always 

published in America. He was born in the 

Lafcadio Hearn ^ • • i j xi ^ t • i •* 

Ionian islands, the son of an Irishman serving 

as surgeon in the British army, and a Greek mother. He was 
educated in preparation for the priesthood, part of the time 
in a boys^ school in Paris. At the age of nineteen he came 
to America and was reporter on a Cincinnati paper. After- 
ward he went to New Orleans, where he did newspaper work 
and wrote tales and sketches. Between 1887 and 1890 he 
spent considerable time in the West Indies, and did some 
journalistic work in New York. In 1890 he went to Japan 
under contract with a magazine to furnish correspondence, 
but remained to become a teacher in the University of Tokio, 
to marry a Japanese wife and become a naturalized citizen 
of the empire, to accept, nominally at least. Buddhism, and 
to direct that his body be cremated according to Buddhist 
rites. 

Hearn's best work before he went to Japan consisted of 
sketches of life and scenes along the Gulf of Mexico and in 
the West Indies. In his later years he pub- 
5f^J.^^ lished many books on Japan and Japanese 

life and thought. The Japanese themselves 
gave him credit for gaining a better insight into the national 
character than any other English speaking writer. His prose 
style was the result of careful, conscientious effort. In his 
earlier sketches it was characterized by richness and over- 
luxuriousness, and by wonderful picturing power. In his 
books on Japan this exuberance was somewhat restrained, 
and though his style was always strongly adjectival, many 
passages in his later work have great excellence of form. 

In wealth, in the dissemination of that intelligence that 
is almost but not quite culture, and in the development of 
higher education the middle West has made great advance in 



478 American Literature 

the last twenty-five years. The literary importance of the 

section has not, however, increased proportionally. This is 

due to several causes. Much of the upper 
The West .... 

Mississippi valley is now in that prosperous 

but unpoetic state of development which must intervene be- 
tween the picturesqueness of pioneer days and the picturesque- 
ness of an old civilization. The commercial rather than the 
artistic ideal dominates the West, even in education. The 
state universities, the most important institutions of higher 
learning, are forced by public sentiment to lay most stress on 
"practical branches of knowledge. Many cities have good 
libraries, and some of them creditable monuments, art gal- 
leries, and musical organizations; but these are often sup- 
ported by men of wealth who realize the value of a culture 
that they do not themselves understand, and are enjoyed by 
women, or by men who have developed the esthetic at the 
expense of other faculties. The most important reason, how- 
ever, why the West cuts so small a figure in the literary world 
is that the majority of Western writers of merit associate 
themselves sooner or later with the East. 

Ohio may fairly lay claim to Edith Thomas, one of the 
better living writers of verse. A reminder of the eagerness 
with which parts of Ohio took up the cause of 
the black man is found in the fact that Paul 
L. Dunbar (1872-1906), a colored writer who achieved con- 
siderable success in both prose and poetrj^, was born and edu- 
cated in that state. 

Indiana has developed a school of writers several of whom 
have become widely popular, though they have never been 
taken very seriously by critics. Wallace and 
Hay have been mentioned in the preceding 
chapter. The most notable living representative is James 
Whitcomb Eiley, an especially popular writer of humorous 
and sentimental poems, largely in dialect. George Ade, 



Eecext Years 479 

author of dramas, stories, essays, and much miscellaneous 
humorous work, is a native of Indiana, though his training as 
a writer was gained in Chicago. Maurice Thompson (1844- 
1901) was born and passed the greater part of his life in 
Indiana, but his early manhood was speni in the South, and 
he served through the war in the Confederate army. Later 
he was railway engineer, lawyer, politician, state geologist 
of Indiana, and for many years non-resident editor of the 
^^iSTew York Independent.^^ His published writings include 
fiction, poetry, books of archery and other sports, popular 
studies in natural science, literary essays, and history. Con- 
sidering the quantity and the variety it is good, but the fa- 
cility with which the author wrote and a certain lack of train- 
ing and restraint interfered with his success. 

Chicago, the metropolis and the leading commercial city 
of the West, is naturally a bookselling and publishing center 
of some importance. Chicago newspapers, 
^ though they bear a reputation for sensational- 

ism, are energetically and ably edited. Two or three pub- 
lishers issue respectable lists of books ; and for some years the 
^^DiaP^ has been recognized as one of the best critical journals 
in the country. Hamlin Garland, whose most realistic stories 
are of life in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Dakota, has many 
associations with the Chicago writers. Harriet Mann Miller, 
who writes sketches on nature and miscellaneous essays over 
the signature of Olive Thorne Miller, was for some time a 
resident of the city. Peter Dunne, the creator of "Mr. 
Dooley,^^ began his humorous sketches while employed on a 
Chicago paper. These writers form no school, and not even a 
group except in a purely geographical sense. 

Eugene Field (1850-1895), the most important writer yet 
distinctly associated with Chicago, was born in Saint Louis 
of New England parentage. His mother died when he was 
very young, and he grew to manhood under the charge of 



480 American Literature 

relatives in Vermont. After spending a few months each at 
Williams college^ Knox college, and the University of Mis- 
souri he became engaged to the fourteen-year- 
^ old sister of a friend, and partly to pass the 

time until she was of marriageable age went abroad. He 
returned after he had exhausted all that was available of 
his patrimony, married, and became a newspaper man in 
Saint Joseph, Saint Louis, Kansas City, and Denver, suc- 
cessively. In 1833 he went to Chicago to take charge of a 
special column in the ^^Daily News,^^ afterward the "Eecord.^^ 
This column, which he entitled ^^Sharps and Flats,^^ he con- 
tinued with slight interruption until his death. 

According to his friends and associates Eield was an un- 
usually lovable, convivial, impecunious, and irresponsible 
newspaper man, a great practical joker, always 
J^ ^ perpetrating hoaxes on his friends and on 

public characters of whatever dignity or 
position. He was fond of writing reports of imaginary 
speeches, and reviews of imaginary books, and anecdotes of 
imaginary children, which he assigned to persons more or 
less in the public eye; and these were often propounded with 
such seriousness as to deceive all but the most sophisticated 
readers. Until he went to Chicago he had read little and 
cared little for literature. There he became interested in the 
old romances and ballads, and later in Horace. It was still 
later that he became addicted to the book collecting of which 
he says so much in his writings. 

Almost everything preserved in Field^s collected works 
appeared first in the ^^ Sharps and Flats^^ column. His first 
books, The Tribune Primer^ published in Den- 
ver in 18,82, and Culture's Garland, Boston, 
1887, are both slight and humorous, and of interest chiefiy 
to collectors. In 1889 he issued A Little Boole of Profitable 
Tales and A Little Boole of Western Verse, Subsequent prose 



Eecent Years 481 

volumes include more tales^ The House, a series of sketches, 
based on the author^s experiences in securing and fitting up 
his own residence^, and Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac, 
The two last named had appeared in detached parts in the 
^^Sharps and Flats^^ column^ and neither was finished at the 
time of the author's death. Of the other volumes of verse the 
most notable are Songs of Childhood, and Echoes from the 
Saline Farm, a series of half-translations and half-parodies 
of Horace^ written by Eugene Field and his brother Eoswell 
Martin Field. 

The chief characteristics of all Field's works are geniality, 
humor, sentimentality, and a tendency to imitation and 

parody, in the broader sense of these terms. 
of Field?"W ^\s ^^^^ ^^' became interested in the romances 

and ballads he made free use, in both prose 
and verse, of a rudely manufactured Old English dialect; 
and in many of his stories he imitates the tone and manner 
of the old tales. At later periods the influence of Christopher 
North, of Father Prout, and of Ber anger is seen in his work. 
He also had a tendency, explained perhaps by the necessity 
of furnishing a stint of copy each day, to imitate or repeat 
himself. Once started on songs for children he wrote not 
only English, but Scotch, Irish, Dutch^ and Japanese lulla- 
bies. The theme of the death of a child, which he handled 
with popular success in ^^Little Boy Blue,'' recurs again land 
again. His prose tales, though iii some way they always 
impress the reader as the expression of a charming person- 
ality, are mostly too artificial and too much overcharged with 
sentiment to take the highest rank. His discursive essays, 
like The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac, though immeasur- 
ably above ordinary newspaper work, show the lack of that 
deep scholarship and broad culture that lie back of the great- 
est informal literary discussions. Much of his verse is 
ephemeral by nature of the subject; much of it is only cleverly 



483 American Literature 

and rather cheaply humorous. Of this sort is ^^The Little 

Peach/^ which for a few years was sung or recited by half 

the comedians in the country. His more sentimental poems 

are effective, but often show a touch of artificiality. Even 

^^Little Boy Blue/^ probably the most popular of all, suggests 

the use of pathos as literary capital. His best work was in 

his poems for children, which include such fanciful lullabies 

as ^^Wynken, Blynken, and Nod/^ and "The Hush-a-bye 

Lady/^ and such semi-humorous appreciations of childish 

feeling as ''Seein' Things at Night.'' 

Eugene Field's importance in American literary history 

comes not from the value of what he wrote, but from his 

relation to the West and to his occupation as 

T . iournalist. Thouprh he owed much to New 

Importance •' ^ 

England, he was a thorough Westerner. He 
declined time after time remunerative offers from Eastern 
newspapers because the East oppressed him. His view of 
life, of books, of culture was that of the section in which he 
lived. Moreover, he furnishes the best illustration that the 
country has yet produced of the possible relations between 
the daily newspaper and the man of letters. Not only 
jokes, hoaxes, poems, and tales, but book-lore and transla- 
tions of Horace were first offered to the patrons of a Chi- 
cago daily, at least nine tenths of whom probably read 
"Sharps and Flats" with persistent interest. The fact that 
he planned his writings for the masses explains many of the 
weaknesses of Field's work, but it is by no means certain that 
it does not account for many of its excellences. He wrote 
for popular readers, but his individuality was so strong that 
he refused to follow the obvious popular demand, and he 
gave to the man on the street glimpses of subjects that are 
usually associated with higher literary culture. Opinions 
will differ as to whether or not this was a desirable achieve- 
ment; but more than any other recent American Eugene 



Eecent Years 483 

Field raises questions as to the future democracy of litera- 
ture. 

William Vaughn Moody (1869-1910) was a native of In- 
diana and a graduate of Harvard with the class of 1893. In 
1895 he was called to the faculty of the Ilni- 
'NLooT^ ^^^ ^ versity of Chicago^ and was nominally con- 
nected with that institution until his death, 
though for the last three years of his life he did little or no 
regular teaching. The Masque of Judgment, published in 
1900, and especially Poems, 1901, were hailed by many critics 
as works of unusual promise. A few pieces, notably the ^^Ode 
in Time of Hesitation,^^ have a sure and sustained manner 
that has rarely been attained in the last three decades. In 
the remaining years of his life the poet did not quite fulfill 
the hopes of his friends. He published The Fire-Bringer 
in 1904, and then turned his attention to the writing of plays. 
His prose drama, ^^The Great Divide,'^ attained great success 
on the stage, and his second play, ^The Faith Healer,^^ had 
some merit. Just before his death it seemed that he might 
accomplish still greater things both as a poet and as a 
dramatist. 

Farther West than Chicago literary production in recent 
years has been less important. To Iowa belongs Alice French, 
who writes, as Octave Thanet, stories of 
SrtherWe^t^ Western life. On the Pacific slope H. H. 
Bancroft is engaged in businesslike fashion 
in preparing the history of the West. Here, too, John Vance 
Cheney wrote his best known poems. 



INDEX 



Abolitionism, 222. 

Abolitionists, 254-284. 

Abbott, Jacob, 354. 

Abbott, John S. C, 354. 

Abbott, Lyman, 470. 

Academy, American, 216. 

Adams and Liberty, 138. 

Adams, Charles Francis, 346. 

Adams, Hannah, 138. 

Adams, John, 104, 107-8, 109, 125, 

136, 138. 
Adams, Rev. John, 85. 
Adams, John Quincy, 200, 203. 
Adams, Samuel, 83, 106-7, 108. 
Addison, 92, 120, 124, 156, 163, 173, 

465; see also ''Spectator.'" 
Address of Father Abraham, 95-6. 
Ade, George, 478-9. 
AdmetuSj 384. 

Admetus and Other Poems, 384. 
Adventures of Captain Bonneville, 

171-2. 
Adventures of Tom Sawyer, 448. 
Advertisement for the Unexperienced 

Planters of New England or Any^ 

where, 5. 
Advice to the Privileged Orders, 131. 
Adulator, 135. 
Afloat and Ashore, 179. 
Age of Reason, 115, 116. 
Ages, 185, 188. 
Airs from Arcady, 468. 
Airs of Palestine, 204. 
Al Aaraaf, 418, 420. 
Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor 

Poems, 414. 
Alcott, Amos Bronson, 224, 242-5: 

life, 242-3, transcendentalism, 

243-4, writings, 244, rank, 245; 

336. 
Alcott, Louisa M., 244, 336. 
Aldrich, T. B., 296, 357, 373, 378-81: 

life, 378-9, prose, 379-80, rank, 

381; 382, 466. 
Algerine Captive, 139. 
Algic Researches, 218. 
Alhambra, 169, 170. 
Alide, 384. 

Allen, Elizabeth Akers, 354. 
Allen, Ethan, 155. 
Allen, James Lane, 464. 



Allston, Washington, 200, 202-3. 

Alnwick Castle, 194. 

Alsop, Richard, 123, 133, 134. 

''Amelia," 438. 

American Anthology, 376. 

American Antiquities, 133-4. 

American Lands and Letters, 347. 

American Note-Books (Hawthorne's), 
308. 

American Scholar, 228. 

Americanisms, 23. 

Ames, Fisher, 110, 156. 

Ames, Nathaniel, 84. 

Among My Books, 270. 

Among the Isles of Shoals, 354. 

Anarchiad, 133-4, 137. 

Ancestral Footstep, 308. 

AndrS (Dunlap), 140. 

AndrS (Lord), 435. 

Annabel Lee, 374, 421, 422. 

Anne Boleyn, 398. 

Anthology Club, 200, 201, 203. 

Anthony Brade, 335. 

Anti-Slavery, first tract favoring, 65. 

Anti-Slavery Movement; see "Aboli- 
tionism." 

Antisynodalia Americana, 45. 

"Apostle of Virginia," 10. 

Appeal to CcBsar, 434. 

**Artemus Ward," 356, 449. 

Arthur Bonnicastle, 338. 

Arthur Mervyn, 151, 152, 153. 

••Arthur Singleton," 205. 

Astoria, 171, 172. 

Atalantis, 428, 430. 

Atlantic Monthly, 259, 269, 275, 322, 
331, 338, 379, 475. 

Auf Wiedersehen, 276. 

Aurelian, 335. 

Autobiography (Franklin's), 75, 89, 
91, 92, 93, 95, 96-7, 98, 99, 100. 

Autobiography (Jefferson's), 118. 

Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table, 321, 
322, 325, 326, 330. 

Ave Roma Immortalis, 472. 

Aylmere, or the Bondman of Kentt 396. 

Baby Bell, 378, 381, 382. 
Backwoodsman, 192. 
Bacon's Rebellion, 14, 15. 
Bagatelles, 95, 97. 



485 



486 



Index 



Ballad of Lager Bier, 375. 

Ballad of Trees and the Master, 410. 

Ballads and Other Poems, 287. 

Ballads of the Revolution, 120-1. 

Bancroft, George, 224, 341, 343-4. 

Bancroft, H. H., 483. 

Barbara Frietchie, 261. 

Barefoot Boy, 261. 

Barlow, Joel, 123, 124, 129, 130-2, 

133. 
Barnard, John, 82. 
Baron's Last Banquet, 352. 
Barriers Burned Away, 370. 
Barstow, Elizabeth, 373. 
Bartol, C. A., 224. 
Barton, B. S., 155. 
Bartram, John, 101. * 

Bartram, William, 155. 
Battle Hymn of the Rep^ihlic, 284. 
Battle of Niagara, 208. 
Battle of the Kegs, 146. 
Battle of Tippecanoe, 385. 
Battle Pieces and Aspects of the War, 

369. 
Bay Fight, 351. 

Bay Psalm Book, 45. 48-9, 68. 
Beauchamp, 431. 
Beaver Brook, 273. 
Bedouin Song, 401. 
Beecher, Henry Ward, 348, 366-8. 
Behemoth, a Legend of the Mound 

Builders, 372. 
Being a Boy, 337. 

Belfry of Bruges and Other Poems, 288. 
Belknap, Jeremy, 153-4. 
Bells, 422. 
Ben Bolt, 385. 
Benedict Arnold, 431. 
Ben-Hur, 440-1. 
Benjamin, Park. 300, 362. 
Berenice, 424. 
Beverley, Robert, 19. 
Bianca Visconti, 358. 
Bible, literary influence of, 24, 27. 
Big Abel and the Little Manhattan, 372. 
Biglow Papers, 126, 268, 273-5, 277, 

282. 
Bill a7}d Joe, 329. 
"Bill Nye," 444. 

Bird, Robert Montgomery, 397. 
"Birdofreedum Say^in," 274, 275. 
Birds, 375. 

Birth of Galahad, 473. 
Bitter-Sweet, 338. 
Black Cat, 424, 427. 
Blair, James, 20. 
Blameless Prince, 377. 
Blithedale Romance, 304, 311, 315-7, 

318. 



Bloody Tenent Washed and Made 
White, 42. 

Bloody Tenent Yet More Bloody, 42. 

Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, 42. 

•'Bohemians," 370, 372-3, 378, 379. 

Boker, George H., 397-8. 

Bonifacius, 75. 

Bonneville, Captain, 171. 

Book of the Dead, 398. 

Border Beagles, 431. 

Bourville Castle, 210. 

Bowditch, Nathaniel, 219. 

Boyesen, Hjalmar Hjorth, 372. 

Boyhood of Christ, 441. 

Boys, The, 329. 

Bracebridge Hall, 166-7, 168. 

Brackenridge, H. H., 119, 140, 146-7, 
438. 

Brackenridge, H. M., 438. 

Bradford, William, 25-8, 29, 30, 31, 
33, 34, 35, 46, 62, 341. 

Bradstreet, Anne, 49-51, 84, 85, 320. 

Bradstreet, Simon, 49. 

Brainard, J. G. C., 200. 

Bravo, 177, 180. 

Breadwinners, 441. 

Breakfast-Table Series, 325, 327. 

Bricks without Straw, 434. 

Broken Harp, 205. 

Brook Farm Community, 224, 230, 
243, 250, 252, 284, 301, 302, 304, 
363. 

Brooks, Marie Gowen, 206. 

Broomstick Train, 329. 

Brown, Charles Brockden, 151-3, 157, 
173, 191, 201, 202, 210. 

Brown, Charles Farrar, 356. 

Brownell, H. H., 351. 

Bro.wnson, Orestes A., 224, 252-3, 
255. 

Brutus, or the Fall of Tarquin, 195. 

Bryant, William Cullen, 145, 160, 
183-90: early years, 183-5, early 
verse, 185, removal to New York, 
185-6, editorial articles, 186^7, 
other prose, 187, poems, 187-8, 
favorite ideas, 188-9, translation 
of Homer, 189, literary importance, 
190; 196, 206, 290, 365, 437. 

Buccaneer, 202. 

Buccaneers and Pirates of our Coasts, 
470. L_, 

Bulkley, Peter, 47. 

Bunner, Henry Cuyler, 468. 

Burroughs, John, 470. 

Butler, Samuel, 120, 156; see Hudi- 
bras. 

Butler, William A., 385. 

Burwell Papers, 14, 15. 



Index 



487 



Burnett, Frances Hodgson, 476. 
Byles, Mather, 86, 87. 
Byrd, William, 17-8, 90. 

Cable, George W., 476. 

Calavar, 397. 

Calaynos, 398. 

Calef, 75 n., 89. 

California and Oregon Trail, 344. 

California writers, 454-60, 483. 

Cambridge Thirty Years Ago, 280. 

"Camilius," 112. 

Candid Examination of the Claims of 
Great Britain and the Colonies, 113. 

Career of Puffer Hopkins, 371. 

Carey, Mathew, 134, 149-50, 207. 

Carleton, Will, 439. 

Cariyian, Bliss, 473. 

Carolina, 433. 

Carter, Robert, 268. 

Carver, Jonathan, 154, 

Cary, Alice, 383. 

Cary, Phoebe, 383. 

Cask of Amontillado, 424. 

Castilian Days, 441. 

Cathedral, 270, 277. 

Cecil Dreeme, 352. 

Celebrated Jumping^ Frog of Calaveras, 
445. 

Century of Dishonor, 453. 

Chainbearer, 179. 

Chambered Nautilus, 330. 

Changeling, 273. 

Channing, Edward T., 200, 201. 

Channing, William Ellery, 51, 200-1. 

Channing. William Ellery (2nd), 251. 
252 302. 

Channing, William H., 224. 

Charlemont, 431. 

Charlotte Temple, 137. 

''Charles Egbert Craddock"; see 
Murfree, M. N. 

Charles Elwood, or the Infidel Con- 
verted, 253. 

Chauncy, Charles, 45. 

Chauncy, Charles (2nd), 82-3. 

Cheerful Yesterdays, 283. 

Cheney, John Vance, 483. 

Chicago as publishing center, 461. 

Child, Lydia Maria, 205, 275. 

Choate, Rufus, 345. 

Christ in Hades, 435. 

Christian Science, 448. 

"Christopher Caustic, M. D.,'* 207-8. 

Christus, a Mystery, 288, 294, 295-6. 

Chronological History of New England, 
61. 

Church, Benjamin, 59, 138. 

Churchill, Charles, 120, 126. 



Churchill, Winston, 466. 

Cigarette-Maker's Romance, 471. 

Cinders from the Ashes, 329. 

Circuit Rider, 440. 

City in the Sea, 421, 422. 

Clara Howard, 151. 

Clari, or the Maid of Milan, 195. 

Clark, Lewis Gaylord, 362, 396. 

Clark, Willis Gaylord, 396. 

Clarke, James Freeman, 224, 248, 
253-4, 255. 

Clapp, Henry, 379. 

Clear Sunshine of the Gospel Breaking 
forth upon the Indians in New 
England, 39. 

Clemens, Samuel L. ; see Twain, Mark. 

Cliffton, William, 150-1. 

Closing Year, 437. 

Cloth of Gold, 382. 

Cobbett, William, 148-9. 

Colden, Cadwallader, 101. 

Colloquy of Monos and Una, 424 

Colonial Literature, 1-102. 

Colorado writers, 452-4. 

Columbia, 128, 129. 

Columbia College, 101. 

Columbiad, 131-2, 135, 159. 

Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming, 
442. 

Commemoration Ode, 270. 

Commodus, 441. 

Common Sense, 114, 115, 116. 

Concord Days, 244. 

Concord Hymn, 237. 

Concord Sohool of Philosophy, 244. 

Condensed Novels, 455, 457. 

Conduct of Life, 228. 

Connecticut, literary supremacy of, 
123. 

Connecticut writers, 123-35, 155, 
197-200, 221, 347-52. 

Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's 
Court, 448, 451. 

Conquered Banner, 412. 

Conquest of Canaan, 127-8, 129, 135. 

Conquest of Granada, 169, 170. 

Conquest of Mexico, 341. 

Conquest of Peru, 341. 

Conrad, Robert Taylor, 396. 

Considerations on the Propriety of Im- 
posing Taxes on the British Col- 
onies, 119. 

Conspiracy of Kings, 131. 

Conspiracy of Pontiac, 344, 345. 

Contemplations, 50. 

Contrast, The, 139. 

Controversial Writings in Revolu- 
tionary time, 103-122. 

Convalescent, 358. 



488 



Index 



Conversations in a Studio, 340. 

Conversations on some of the Old 
Poets, 268, 278. 

Conversations with Children on the 
Gospels, 243. 

Conway, Moncure D., 439. 

Coolbrith, Ina D., 460. 

Cook, Ebenezer, 15-7. 

Cooke, John Esten, 411. 

Cooke, Philip Pendleton, 410-1. 

Cooke, Rose Terry, 352. 

Cooper, James Fenimore, 160, 173, 
174-83: early life, 174, early writ- 
ings, -175-7, writings abroad, 177, 
controversies, 177-8, later writings, 
178-9, personality, 180-1, hterary 
importance, 181-3; 190, 191, 192, 
214, 221, 368, 431, 432, 450, 467. 

Coplas de Manrique, 286, 292. 

Coquette, 138. 

Coral Grove, 199. 

Com, 406, 409. 

Correspondent, 125, 127, 129. 

Cotton Boll, 433. 

Cotton, John, 38, 39, 41-3, 47, 69, 
87. 

Count Frontenac and New France under 
Louis XIV, 345. 

Count Julian, 430. 

Country of the Pointed Firs, 467. 

Country Sleighing, 378. 

Courtin', The, 274. 

Courtship of Miles Standish, 295, 
297. 

Craigie House, 288, 289. 

Cranch, Christopher P., 224, 251, 252. 

Crane, Stephen, 472, 473-4. 

Crater, 179. 

Crawford, Francis Marion, 470-2. 

Crayon Miscellany, 171. 

Crevecoeur, Jean Hector St. John, de, 
148. 

Crisis, The, 115, 116. 

Croaker Papers, 193. 

Crowded Street, 188. 

Cudjo's Cave, 333. 

Culprit Fay, 193. 

Culture's Garland, 480. 

Curiositu 204 

Curtis, George William, 224, 252, 361, 
363-5. 

Cypriad, 204. 

Damsel of Darien, 430. 

Dana, Charles A., 224, 250, 252, 255, 

357, 361. 
Dana, Richard H., 51, 200, 201, 320. 
Dana, R. H., Jr., 331, 332, 369. 
Dance to Death, 384. 



Dante, Longfellow's translation, 297; 
Parsons's translation, 339. 

Day of Doom, 52-4, 199. 

Days, 237. 

Deacon's Masterpiece, 329. 

Death of the Flowers, 190. 

Declaration of Independence, 107, 
118-9, 145, 156. 

Deephaven, 467. 

Deer slayer, 178, 179. 

Defense of the Constitutions of Govern- 
ment of the United States of Amer- 
ica, 107. 

Deland, Margaret W., 466. 

Democracy and other Addresses, 271. 

Democracy Unveiled, 207. 

Democratic Vistas, 387, 392, 393. 

Dennie, Joseph, 209. 

Descent into the Maelstrom, 423. 

Description of New England, 5. 

Dial, 224, 229, 238, 244, 245, 248, 249, 
251, 252, 253. 

Diamond Lens, 371. 

Diamond Wedding, 375. 

Diary, Sewall's, 65-6, 89. 

Diary in Canada, 388. 

Dickens in Camp, 458. 

Dickinson, Emily, 466-7. 

Dickinson, John, 113-4, 120. 

Dictionary, Webster's, 156, 219; Wor- 
cester's, 219. 

"Diedrich Knickerbocker," 163. 

Discourses of Davilla, 107. 

Divine Tragedy, 288, 295. 

Dixie, 436. 

Doctor Grimshaw*s Secret, 309. 

Doctor Heidegger's Experiment, 309, 
310. 

Dodge, Mary Mapes, 365. 

Do Good Papers, 92. 

Dolliver Romance, 306, 309. 

Don Orsino, 471. 

Doorstep, 378. 

Dorr, Julia C. R., 466. 

Douglass, William, 63-4. 

Drake, Joseph Rodman, 160, 192-3, 
194. 

Drama, 54, 55; recent tendencies in, 
465. 

Dream Life, 347. 

Dred, a Tale of the Dismal Swamp, 350. 

Dudley, Thomas, 49. 

Dukesborough Tales, 475. 

Dulany, Daniel, 119. 

Dunbar, Paul L., 478. 

Dunlap, William, 140, 191. 

Dunne, Peter, 479. 

Dutchman's Fireside, 192. 

Dwight, J. S., 224. 



Index 



489 



Dwight, Theodore, 123, 133, 134. 
Dwight, Timothy, 123, 125, 126-30, 

132. 
Dying Raven, 202. 

Eastburn, James W., 196. 

"Easy Chair" Essays, 364, 365. 

Echo, 134. 

Echo Club, 402. 

Echoes from the Sabine Farm, 481. 

Edgar A. Poe and His Critics, 353. 

Edgar Huntley, 151, 152. 

Education in New England, 21-2, 67; 
in New York, 101 ; in Pennsylvania, 
99; in Southern colonies, 13. 

Edwards, Jonathan, 68, 76-81: tem- 
perament, 76, early years, 77, 
ministry, 77-8, at Northampton, 
78, writings, 79-81 ; 90, 126, 352. 

Edwin Brothertoft, 352. 

Egan, Maurice Francis, 475. 

Elegiac verse in New England col- 
onies, 46-8. 

Elegy on the Times, 125. 

Eleonora, 425. 

Eliot, John, 48. 

Elizabethan influence on American 
hterature, 1, 2, 3, 4, 32. 

Elsie Venner, 322, 327. 

Embargo, 185. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 224, 225-238: 
early life, 225-6, as pastor, 226-7, 
in Europe, 227, as lecturer, 227, 
later years, 228, prose writings, 
228, verse, 229, personal and intel- 
lectual qualities, 229-31, literary 
tastes, 231-2, message, 232-3, op- 
timism, 234; literary qualities, 
234-7, rank, 238; 242, 243, 247, 248, 
269, 287, 289, 322, 328, 331, 334, 
363, 382, 384, 458, 464, 473. 

Endicott, John, 29. 

Endicott and the Red Cross, 310, 311. 

English, Thomas Dunn, 385. 

English criticisms of American lit- 
erature, 158. 

English influence in Southern col- 
or^ ies, 1, 2, 3, 14; in New England 
colonies, 22-25. 

English Lands, Letters, and Kings, 
347. 

English Note-Books, 308. 

English Traits, 228, 235. 

Entertaining Passages Relating to 
Philip's War, 59. 

Epochs, 384. 

Essays and Reviews, 334. 

Essay for the Recording of Illustrious 
Providences, 74. 



Essay on the Canon and Feudal Law, 

107. 
Essays to Do Good, 75. 
Eternal Goodness, 262. 
Eggleston, Edward, 440. 
Eureka, 426. 
Eutaw, 431. 

Evangeline, 288, 293, 294, 295, 297. 
Evening Song, 410. 
Everett, Alexander H., 200. 
Everett, Edward, 200, 203. 
Excelsior, 290. 
Excursions, 240. ^-- 

"Fabius," 114. 

Fable for Critics, 268, 272, 275-6. 

Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar, 424. 

Fair God, 440. 

Faith Doctor, 440. 

Faith Healer, 483. 

Fall of the House of Usher, 423, 424. ; 

Famous Old People, 301. 

Fanny, 194. 

Fanshawe, 299, 300, 311, 319. 

Father, 140. 

Father Abbey's Will, 86. 

"Father Abraham," 95-6. 

Faust, Taylor's translation, 401, 402, 
403. 

Fay, T. S., 363. 

Federalist, 110, 111-2, 119. 

Female Poets of America, 362. 

Ferdinand and Isabella, 341, 342. 

Fessenden, Thomas Green, 207. 

Fiction, early substitutes for, 60. 

Field, Eugene, 479-83: life, 479, char- 
acter, 480, writings, 480-1, charac- 
teristics and importance, 481-3. 

Field, Roswell Martin, 481. 

Fields, James T., 259, »269, 303, 311, 
331-2. 

Figs and Thistles, 434. 

Fire-Bringer, 483. 

Fireside Travels, 269, 280, 282. 

Fish I Didn't Catch, 262. 

Fiske, John, 336-7. 

Fitz-Adam's Story, 277. 

Fleur-de-Luce, 288. 

Flight of Youth, 375. 

Flint, Timothy, 213, 214, 218, 436. 

"Florence Percy," 354. 

Florence Vane, 411. 

Folger, Peter, 87-8, 91. 

Following the Equator, 448. 

Fool's Errand, 434, 435. 

Fool's Prayer, 459. 

For an Autograph, 276. 

Forayers, 431. "^ 

Ford, Paul Leicester, 472, 474. 



490 



Index 



Forest Hymn, 190. 

Forest Life, 371. 

Foresters, 154. 

Foster, Hannah W., 138. 

Foster, Stephen C, 441. 

Four Ages of Man, 49, 56. 

Four Elements, 49. 

Four Humours, 49. 

Four Monarchies, 49. 

Four Seasons of the Year, 49. 

Francesca da Rimini, 398. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 75, 88, 90-9: 
early years, 90-1, early writings, 
92, characteristics, 92, in Phila- 
delphia, 93, later years, 94, writ- 
ings, 94-7, as teacher, 98; 101, 112, 
148, 149, 155. 

Franklin, James, 91, 92, 93. 

Franklin in France, 333. 

Freedom of the Will, Edwards' trea- 
tise on, 79, 81. 

Freeman, Mary E. Wilkins, 464, 466. 

Freneau, Philip, 119, 140-145: early 
life, 141, poems, 141-4, significance 
of, 145; 146, 193. 

French, Alice, 483. 

Froissart Ballads and Other Poems, 411. 

Fruitlands, 243. 

Fuller, Margaret, 224, 245-8: life, 
245-6, personality, 246-7, writings, 
247-8; 252, 275, 316, 320, 361. 

Fun Jottings, 358. 

Furness, Horace Howard, 474. 

Gabriel Conroy, 455, 457. 
Gallagher, William D., 437-8. 
Galloway, Joseph, 113. 
Garden, Alexander, 20. 
Gardiner, J. S. J., 200. 
Garland, HamHn, 464, 479. 
Garrison, William Lloyd, 255-6, 257, 

258. 
Gates Ajar, 335. 
Gazette Publications, 147. 
General History of Connecticut, 155. 
General Historic of Virginia, 5, 11, 

20. 
Gentle Boy, 300, 310. 
"Gentleman at Halifax," 106, 109. 
Georgia Writers, 20, 212-3, 475-6. 
German influence at Harvard College, 

203. 
Gettysburg Address, 439. 
Gettysburg Ode, 401. 
Gilded Age, 337, 448. 
Gilder, Richard Watson, 357. 
Giles Corey, 296. 
Gladiator, 397. 
Glenmary, 358, 360. 



Glimpses of California and the Mis- 

aions, 453. 
Godfrey, Thomas, 100. 
Godfrey, James, 101. 
Godkin, Edwin Lawrence, 365. 
God's Controversy with New England^ 

61. 
Godwin, Parke, 365. 
Gold-Bug, 424, 425, 427. 
Gold Foil Hammered from Popular 

Proverbs, 338. 
Golden Legend, 288, 294, 295, 296. 
Good Gray Poet, 394. 
Good News from Virginia, 10. 
Good Samaritans, 404. 
Goodrich, Samuel G.. 197, 198, 199. 

300, 307, 357. 
Gookin, Daniel, 36. 
Gould, Hannah F., 205. 
Grady, Henry W., 476. 
Grandfather's Chair, 301. 
Gray Champion, 310. 
Graysons, 440. 
Great Awakening, 76, 78. 
Great Carbuncle, 310. 
Great Divide, 483. 

Great K. and A. Train Robbery, 474. 
Greeley, Horace, 224, 245, 250, 360-1. 
Green, Joseph, 87. 
Green Mountain Boys, 353. 
Greene, Albert G., 352. 
Greenfield Hill, 128, 129. 
Griswold, Rufus Wilmot, 361-2, 374, 

395, 413, 416, 419. 
Group (Mercy Warren), 135. 
Group (William Cliffton), 150-1. 
Guardian Angel, 322, 327. 
Guesses at the Beautiful, 442, 
Guy Rivers, 428, 431. 

"H. H.," 452-4. 

Hadad, 199. 

Hagar in the Wilderness, 359. 

Hail Columbia, 210. 

Hale, Edward Everett, 331, 332-3, 

466. 
Hale in the Bush, 121. 
Hale, Sarah J., 395, 396. 
Half-Century of Conflict, 345. 
Hall, James, 213, 214, 218, 436. 
Halleck, FitzGreene, 150, 193-4, 385. 
Halpine, Charles G., 385. 
Hamilton, Alexander, 111-2. 
Hanging of the Crane, 296. 
Hannah Thurston, 402. 
Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skatea] 

366. 
Hans Breitmann Ballads, 397. 
Hardy, Arthur Sherburne, 466. 



Index 



491 



Harpe's Head, a Legend of Kentucky, 
214. 

Harris, Joel Chandler, 464, 475-6. 

Harris Collection of American Po- 
etry, 352. 

Harte, Bret, 444, 445, 454-8: life, 
454-5, personality, 455, treatment 
of California scenes, 456, writings, 
456-8, rank, 458. 

Hartford Wits, 123-35: list of, 123, 
conservative tendencies of, 124, 
Trumbull, 124-6, Timothy Dwight, 
126-30, Barlow, 130-2, Humph- 
reys, 132, Hopkins, 133, Theodore 
Dwight, 133, Aisop, 133, joint 
writings, 133-4, significance of 
group, 134-5; 151, 197, 207. 

Harvard College, 22, 77, 81, 86, 123. 

Harvard Commemoration Ode^ 276-7, 
281. 

Hasty Pudding, 131. 

Hathorne; see Hawthorne. 

Haunted Palace, 422. 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 29, 33, 152, 
199, 224, 268, 269, 275, 284, 285, 
291, 293, 298-320: early life, 298-9, 
early writings, 299-301, at Boston 
and Brook Farm, 301-2, at Old 
Manse and Salem, 302-3, later 
residences and travels, 303-6, per- 
sonal characteristics, 306-8, post- 
humous publications, 308-9, short 
tales, 310-11, romances, 311-18, 
literary characteristics, 318-20; 
331, 374, 418, 422, 423. 

Hay, John, 441, 478. 

Hayne, Paul H., 429, 432, 433-4. 

Headsman, 177. 

Hearn, Lafcadio, 476-7. 

Hearts of Oak, 120. 

Heartsease and Rue, 271, 277. 

Heathen Chinee, 455, 458. 

Hedge, F. H., 224. 

Heidenmauer, 177. 

Henry, Patrick, 116-7. 

Her Letter, 458. 

Hermitage, 459. 

Hesperia, 213. 

Hiawatha, 288, 294, 295, 297. 

Higgeson, Francis, 35. 

Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, 266, 
269, 283, 389, 466. 

HillhousQ, James A., 199. 

Historical Collections of the Indians in 
New England, 36. 

Historical writings in New England, 
25, 57-66, 341-5. 

Historie of Travaile into Virginia 
Brittania, 0. 



History of the Navy of the United 
States, 178. 

History of New England, 28-30. 

History of Plymouth Plantation, 26-8, 
29. 

History of Printing in America, 217. 

History of the Dividing Line, 17, 18. 

History of the Western Insurrection, 
438. 

Hobomok, 205. 

Holland, Josiah Gilbert, 338. 

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 61, 269, 284, 
287. 320-31: early life, 320-1, 
early writings, 321, later life, 322, 
literary career, 322-3, personal and 
intellectual' characteristics, 323-5, 
prose writings, 325-9, poems, 329- 
30, literary rank, 330-1; 356, 377, 
382, 385, 449. 

Home as Found, 178. 

Home, Sweet Home, 194, 195. 

Homer, Bryant's translation, 187, 
189. 

"Homer Wilbur," 273. 

Homeward Bound, 178. 

Honorable Peter Sterling, 474. 

Hooker, Thomas, 39, 47. 

Hoosier Schoolboy, 440. 

Hoosier Schoolmaster, 440. 

Hope Leslie, 206. 

Hopkins, Lemuel, 123, 133, 134. 

Hopkins, Stephen, 109. 

Hopkinson, Francis, 145-6. 

Hopkinson, Joseph, 210. 

Horseshoe Robinson, 211. 

"Hosea Biglow," 274. 

Hospital Sketches, 336. 

Hot Plowshares, 434. 

House, 481. 

House by the Sea, 404. 

House of Night, 143, 144, 145. 

House of the Seven Gables, 299, 303, 
304, 311, 314-5. 

Hovey, Richard, 472-3. 

How Old John Brown Took Harper's 
Ferry, 375. 

How to Write a Blackwood Article, 427. 

Howadji in Syria, 363. 

Howard, Martin, 109. 

Howe, JuHa Ward, 283, 466, 471. 

Howells, William Dean, 291, 357, 368, 
372, 446, 463. 

Hubbard, William, 58, 63. 

Huckleberry Finn, 379, 444, 448, 449, 
450, 451. 

Hudibras, 16, 32, 126, 134, 207. 

Humorists, later New England, 356; 
later New York, 372; later West- 
ern, 443-62. 



492 



Index 



Humphreys, David, 123, 132. 
Hundredth Man^ 470. 
Hunters of Men, 260. 
Hurrygraphs, 358. 
Hush-a-hye Lady, 482. 
Hutchinson, Thomas, 62-3, 153. 
Hutton, Laurence, 469. 
Hyperion, a Romance, 286, 287, 290, 

291 292. 
Hymn to the North Star, 188, 190. 
Hymn Written during a Voyage, 87. 
Hymns of the Marshes, 409. 
Hymns to the Gods, 435. 

Ichahod, 260, 264, 377. 

Idle Man, 201. 

Idlewild, 358, 360. 

Idomen, 206. 

"Ik Marvel," 347. 

Iliad, Bryant's translation, 187. 

Illinois writers, 479. 

Illustrations, effects of on recent writ- 
ings, 462-3. 

Imp of the Perverse, 424. 

In the Harbor, 289. 

Inchiquin, the Jesuit's Letters, 210. 

Indian Burying Ground, 144. 

Indiana writers, 478-9. 

Indirection, 443. 

Infidel, 397. 

Ingersoll, Charles Jared, 210. 

Ingersoll, Robert G., 443. 

Innocents Abroad, 446, 447, 448, 449. 

Iowa writers, 483. 

Irving, Pierre M., 171, 172. 

Irving, Peter, 163. 

Irving, Washington, 160, 162-74: 
youth, 162, early writings, 162-3, 
Knickerbocker's History, 163-5, 
Sketch Book, 165, Bracebridge 
Hall, 166, Tales of a Traveller, 167, 
Spanish writings, 169-70, writings 
on American subjects, 170-1, later 
biographies, 172-3, general char- 
acteristics, 173-4; 190, 191, 192, 
196. 214, 221, 285, 342, 347, 368, 
465. 

Irving, WilHam, 163, 191. 

Israfel, 421, 422. 

Italian Note-Books, 308. 

*'Jack Hazard" stories, 333. 

Jack Tier, 180. 

Jackson, Helen Hunt, 452-4. 

Jacobiniad, 137. 

Jacquerie, 406. 

James, Henry, 231, 463, 470. 

Jamestown colony, writings in, 1-11. 

Jane Talbot, 151, 153. 



Janice Meredith, 474. 

Jay, John, 112. 

Jefferson, Thomas, 104, 107, 117-9. 

Jefferson, Joseph, 167. 

JephthaKs Daughter, 359. 

Jesuits in North America, 345. 

Jewett, Sarah Orne, 464, 467. 

Jim, 458. 

Jim Bludsoe, 441. 

Joan of Arc, 451, 448. 

"Joaquin Miller," 460. 

John Brent, 352. 

John Bull and Brother Jofiathan, 192. 

John Endicott, 296. 

John Godfrey's Fortunes, 402. 

Johns Hopkins University, 405. 

Johnson, Edward, 33-4, 56. 

Johnston, Richard Malcolm, 475. 

Jonathan Oldstyle Papers, 162-3, 164. 

Jonathan to John, 275. 

Jones, Hugh, 19. 

Joseph and his Friend, 402. 

"Josh Billings," 443. 

Josselyn, John, 36. 

Journey to the Land of Eden, 17. 

Judas Maccaboeus, 296. 

Judd, Sylvester, 354-5. 

Judgment {The), A Vision, 199. 

Judith and Holofernes, 380. 

Judith, Esther, and other Poems, 206. 

Jugurtha, 290. 

Julian, or Scenes in Judea, 335. 

June, 189. 

Justice and Expediency, 262, 257. 

Kathrina, 338. 

Kavanagh, 288, 291, 327. 

Katherine Walton, 431. 

Keep Cool, 208. 

Keimer, Samuel, 93, 99-100. 

Kennedy, John P., 211. 

Kentucky writers, 213, 214, 436-8. 

Keramos, 289, 290. 

Key, Francis Scott, 212. 

Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, 349. 

Kinsman, 431. 

Kirkland, Caroline M., 371. 

Knapp, Samuel L., 217. 

"Knickerbocker" writers, 160-196, 

197, 275. 
Knickerbocker's History of New York, 

161, 163-5, 167, 174. 
Knight, Henry Coggswell, 204. 
Knight, Sarah Kemble, 66. 
Koenigsmark and Other Poems, 398. 
Koningsmarke, the Long Finne, 192. 

Ladd, Joseph Brown, 139. 
Ladies of Castile, 136. 



Index 



493 



Lady Jane, 358, 359. 

Lody or the Tiger, 469. 

Lanier, Sidney, 389, 405-10: life, 

405-7, personality, 407, scholar- 
1 ship, 407-8, prose, 408, poems, 

409-10, rank, 410. 
Larcom, Lucy, 284. 
Lars, a Pastoral of Norway, 401. 
La Salle or the Discovery of the Great 

West, 345. 
Last Leaf, 329. 
Last of the Mohicans, 177, 179, 182, 

431. 
Late Mrs. Null, 470. 
Launcelot and Guenevere, 473. 
Laurens, Henry, 155. 
Laus Deo, 260. 
Lawson, John, 20. 
Lawyers in early New England, 67. 
Lay of the Scottish Fiddle, 192. 
"Lay Preacher, The," 210. 
Lazarus, Emma, 384. 
Leather Stocking and Silk, 411. 
"Leather stocking" tales, 179. 
Leaves of Grass, 386, 387, 390, 393, 

394, 
Legend of Thomas Didymus, the Jew- 
ish Sceptic, 254. 
Legend of Brittany, 268. 
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, 166, 167, 

168. 
Legends of New England, 258. 
Legends of the Conquest of Spain, 169. 
Legends of the Province House, 310. 
Legends of the West, 214. 
Lexcester 140 

Leland, Charles Godfrey, 396-7. 
Leonard, Daniel, 107, 109. 
Leonor de Guzman, 398. 
Leslie, Eliza, 396. 
Lessons in Life, 338. 
Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax, 

109. 
Letters and Social Aims, 229. 
Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer, 

114. 
Letters from Palmyra; see Zenohia. 
Letters from the South, 205. 
Letters from the West, 214. 
Letters from Under a Bridge, 358. 
Letters of an American Farmer, 148. 
Letters of the British Spy, 211. 
Letters to Peter Doyle, 388. 
Liberator, 255. 
Liberty Song, 114, 120. 
Liberty Tree, 301. 

Library of American Literature, 376. 
Life Here and There, 358. 
Life of Columbus, 169, 170. 



Life of Goldsmith, 172. 

Life of Washington, 172. 

Life on the Mississippi, 445, 448, 449, 
450, 451. 

Ligeia, 423, 425, 426. 

Lincoln, Abraham, 216, 438-9. 

Linn, John Blair, 210. 

Linwoods, 206. 

Lionel Lincoln, 176, 180. 

Literature and Life, 334. 

Literature of the Age of Elizabeth, 
334. 

Literary and Social Essays, 364. 

Literary Landmarks of London, 469. 

Little Beach-Bird, 202. 

Little Book of Profitable Tales, 480. - 

Little Book of Western Verse, 480. 

Little Boy Blue, 481, 482. 

Little Breeches, 441. 

Little Giffin of Tennessee, 435. 

Little Peach, 482. 

Little People of the Snow, 189. 

Little Women, 336. 

Livingston, William, 102. 

Locke, David Ross, 444. 

Loiterings of Travel, 358. 

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 268, 
269, 284, 285-98: life and writings, 
285-9, character, 289-90, prose, 
290-1, poems, 292-7, rank as poet, 
297-8; 299, 327, 331, 346, 382, 383, 
384, 419, 420, 458. 

Longfellow, Samuel, 331, 334. 

Looking Glass for the Times, 88. 

Lord, W. W., 377, 435. 

Lost Occasion, 264. 

Lotus-Eating, 364. 

Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac, 481. 

Love in Old Cloathes and other Stories, 
468. 

Lowell, James Russell, 198, 232, 266- 
83: early life, 266-7, early literary 
work, 267-8, academic and editorial 
labors, 268-9, later writings, 269- 
70, poHtical career, 270-1, per- 
sonality, 271-2, early verse, 272-3, 
Biglow Papers, 273-5, poems, 
275-7, prose, 277-80, hterary char- 
acteristics, 280-3; 287, 290, 322, 
329, 331, 334, 335, 338, 356, 377, 
382,419. 

Lowell, Robert Traill Spence, 331, 
335. 

Luck of Roaring Camp, 454, 456. 

Luck of Roaring Camp and other 
Sketches, 455. 

Lunt, George, 340. 

Lyars, 137. 

Lyceums, 227. 



494 



Index 



Mabel Martin, 261. 

Mabie, Hamilton W., 470. 

McFingal, 125-6. 

Made in France, 468. 

Madison, James, 112, 119. 

Magazines, recent tendencies in, 
462. 

Ma^nalia Christi Americana, 61, 
74-5. 

Mahomet and his Successors, 172. 

Maine writers, 354-5. 

Maine Woods, 240. 

** Major Jack Downing," 356. 

Man without a Country, 333. 

MS. Found in a Bottle, 422. 

Map of Virginia, 5, 7. 

Marble Faun, 305, 308, 316, 317. 

Marco Bozzaris, 194. 

Margaret, a Tale of the Real and Ideal, 
355. 

Margaret Smith's Journal, 262. 

"Maria del Occidente," 206, 291. 

Marjory Daw, 380. 

"Mark Twain"; see Twain, Mark. 

Markoe, Peter, 148. 

Marriage of Guenevere, 473. 

Marshall, John, 217. 

Marshes of Glynn, 409. 

Martin Faber, 428. 

Maryland writers, 15-7, 119, 211, 
212, 404-10, 475. 

Masque of the Gods, 401. 

Masque of Judgment, 483. 

Masque of Pandora, 289, 296. 

Masque of the Red Death, 425. 

Mason, Captain John, 33. 

Massachusetts, literary supremacy of, 
123, 221. 

Massachusetts Bay Colony, 21, 28. 

Massachusetts to Virginia, 260, 433. 

Massachusetts writers, 21-90, 105-9, 
135-8, 200-7, 222-347. 

"Massachusettensis," 107, 109. 

Mather, Cotton, 60, 68, 69-76: birth, 

^^ 69, education, 70, connection with 
witchcraft, 71, character, 72, lit- 
erary style, 73, writings, 74; 90, 
92, 101. 

Mather, Increase, 58, 68-76: birth, 
68, education, 69, political mission, 
69-70, revolt against, 70, connec- 
tion with witchcraft, 71, charac- 
ter, 72, literary style, 73, writings, 
74-6; 92. 

Mather, Richard, 45, 48, 68, 87. 

Mathews, Cornelius, 371. 

Matthews, Brander, 470. 

Maud Muller, 261, 264. 

May-Day, 229, 236. 



May-Day, or New York in an Uproar, 
139. 

Mayhew, Jonathan, 83. 

May-Pole of Merry Mount, 33, 311. 

Meat out of the Eater, 51. 

Medical Essays, 323, 328. 

Medicine in early New England, 67. 

Meditations, 50. 

Medler, 125, 127, 129. 

Mellichampe, 431. 

Melville, Herman, 304, 368-370. 

Memorial Verse in New England colo- 
nies, 46-8. 

Mercedes of Castile, 179. 

Merry Mount, 30, 33. 

Merry Mount, 33, 342. 

Merry Tales of the Three Wise Men 
of Gotham, 192. 

Miami Woods, 437. 

Michael Angelo, 289, 296. 

Michael Bonham, 431. 

Middle Colonies, 90-102. 

Miles Standish, 288. 

Miller, Cincinnatus Hiner, 460. 

Miller, Harriet Mann, 479. 

MHton, 2, 23, 24, 143. 

Ministers, Early New England, 37-8, 
66-84. 

Minister's Black Veil, 310. 

Minister's Wooing, 350. 

Miscellanies, 235. 

"Mr. Dooley," 479. 

Mr. Isaacs, 471. 

"Mrs. Mary Clavers," 371. 

"Mrs. Partington," 356. 

Mitchell, Donald G., 347, 466. 

Mitchell, Samuel, 163. 

Mitchell, Silas Weir, 474. 

Moby Dick, or the White Whale, 369. 

Modern Chivalry, 147, 438. 

Mogg Megone, 259, 261. 

Moll Pitcher, 258, 261. 

Monaldi, 202. 

Monikins, 178. 

Monna Lisa, 276. 

"M. Dupin," 425, 426. 

Montcalm and Wolfe, 345. 

Moody, WiUiam Vaughn, 483. 

More Wonders of the Invisible Worlds 
75, note. 

Morrell, William, 54. 

Morella, 424, 425. 

Morris, George P., 195, 358, 363. 

Mortal Antipathy, 322, 327. 

Morton, Nathaniel, 34-5, 47. 

Morton, Sarah Wentworth, 205. 

Morton, Thomas, 30-3: his settle- 
ment at Merry Mount, 30, his 
book, 31, his character, 32-3. 



Index 



495 



Morton's Hope, 342. 

Mosses from an Old Manse, 302, 310. 

Motley, John Lothrop, 33, 322, 328. 

Moulton, Louise Chandler, 336. 

Mount Wollaston, 30. 

Mourfs Relation, 26. 

Murders in the Rue Morgue, 423, 425, 

427. 
Murfree, Mary N., 464, 476. 
Murray, Lindley, 156. 
My Country, His of Thee, 334. 
My Double and How he Undid Me, 333. 
My Farm of Edgewood, 347. 
My First Client, 267. 
My Garden Acquaintance, 280. 
My Hunt After the Captain, 328. 
My Life is like the Summer Rose, 

213. 
My Lost Youth, 295. 
My Mind and its Thoughts, 205. 
My Own Story, 333. 
My Study Windows, 270, 280. 
My Summer in a Garden, 337. 
Mystery of Marie Roget, 425. 
Myth of Hiawatha and other Oral 

Legends, 218. 

Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, 415, 
422, 424, 425. 

Narratives of Surprising Conversions, 
77. 

Nasby in Exile, 4A4i, 

Nature, 228, 232. 

Nathan, James, 246, 247. 

Nathan Hale, 121. 

"Native of Algiers," 148. 

Natural History of the Intellect, 229, 
235. 

Nature and Elements of Poetry, 376, 
377. 

Nature's Serial Story, 370. 

Navarette, 169. 

Neal, John, 208-9, 268. 

Near to Nature's Heart, 370. 

Ned Meyers, 179. 

Nellie was a Lady, 442. 

New American Cyclopedia, 250, 252. 

New Connecticut, 244. 

New England characteristics seen in 
Franklin, 98-9. 

New England characteristics in co- 
lonial time, 21-2, 54-6. 

New England, literary supremacy and 
decline, 159-60, 221, 461. 

New England Two Centuries Ago, 279. 

New England Tragedies, 288, 295, 296. 

New England writers, 21-90, 105-10, 
123-40, 153-5, 197-209, 222-356, 
466-8; Poe's attitude toward, 419. 



New England's Lamentations for Old 

England Errours, 39. 
New England's Memorial, 34-5, 47. 
New England's Plantation, 35. 
New England's Prospect, 35, 46. 
New England's Rarities Discovered, 36. 
New England's Trials, 5. 
New English Canaan, 31-2, 33. 
New Gospel of Peace according to 

Saint Benjamin, 366. 
New Hampshire writers, 139, 354. 
New Home {A): Who'll Follow? 371. 
New Jersey writers, 140-5. 
New Pastoral, 404. 
New Priest in Conception Bay, 335. 
New Roof, 146. 
New Study of Shakespeare's Sonnets, 

365. 
New York, as publishing center, 461; 

loses literary supremacy, 221. 
New York writers, 101-2, 110-2, 140, 

160-96, 356-95, 468-74. 
Newell, Robert H., 372. 
News from Virginia, 10. 
Nile Notes of a Howadji, 363. 
Niles, Samuel, 64. 
Nina Gordon; see Dred, 
Norman Leslie, 363. 
Norman Maurice, 431. 
North American Review, 200, 201, 217, 

269-70. 
North CaroHna writers, 20. 
Norton, Charles Eliot, 271, 331, 

333—4. 
Norton,' John, 47, 69, 85. 
Norwood, Colonel, 18-9. 
Norwood; or Village Life in New 

England, 367, 368. 
Nothing to Wear, 385. 
Notions of the Americans picked up by 

a Travelling Bachelor, 177. 
Notes on Virginia, 118. 
Nova Anglia, 54. 
*'Novangelus," 107. 
Noyes, Nicholas, 85. 
Nye, Edgar W., 444. 

Oak Openings, 179. 

Oakes, Urian, 81, 85. 

O'Brien, Fitz James, 370-1, 373, 379, 

402. 
O'Connor, W. D., 394. 
"Octave Thanet," 483. 
Ode in Time of Hesitation, 483. 
Ode to the Mocking-Bird, 436. 
Odell, Jonathan, 121-2. 
Odyssey, Bryant's translation, 187. 
Ohio writers, 213, 214, 439, 478. 
Old Bachelor, 212. 



496 



Index 



Old Black Joe, 442. 

Old English Dramatists, 267. 

Old Folks at Home, 442. 

Old Grimes, 352. 

Old Ironsides, 321. 

Old Kentucky Home, 442. 

Old Man's Idyl, 443. 

Old Manse, 302. 

Old Oaken Bucket, 195. 

Old Regime in Canada, 345. 

Old-Town Folks, 350. 

Olive Branch, 150. 

"Olive Thorne Miller"; see Miller, 
Harriet Mann. 

"Oliver Oldschool," 209. 

Omoo, 369. 

On a Bust of Dante, 339. 

On a Certain Condescension in For- 
eigners, 280. 

On the Defeat of a Great Man, 377. 

On the True Grandeur of Nations, 
346. 

One- H OSS Shay; see Deacon's Master- 
piece. 

Opening of a Chestnut Burr, 370. 

O'Reilly, John Boyle, 340. 

Oriental Songs, 382. 

Ormond, 151, 153. 

"Orpheus C. Kerr," 372. 

Orphic Sayings, 244. 

Osgood, Francis Sargent, 340. 

Ossoli, Countess; see Fuller, Mar- 
garet. 

Otis, James, 83, 105-6, 108, 135. 

Ouabi, 205. 

Our Hundred Days in Europe, 323, 
329. 

Our Old Home, 306, 308. 

Out Doors at Idlewild, 358. 

Out of the Past, 365. 

Outcasts of Poker Flat, 454, 456. 

Outre-Mer, 286, 290. 

Over the Tea-Cups, 323, 326, 329. 

Ovid's Metamorphoses, translated by 
Sandys, 9. 

Owen, Robert Dale, 438. 

"Pacificus," 112. 

Page, Thomas Nelson, 464, 475. 

Pages from an Old Volume of Life, 

323, 328. 
Paine, Robert Treat, 137-8. 
Paine, Thomas, 114-6. 
Pan in Wall Street, 377. 
Paper City, 444. 

Papers on Literature and Art, 248. 
Parrhasius, 359. 

Parker, Theodore, 224, 248-50, 255. 
Parkman, Francis, 341, 344-5. 



Parnassus, 229. 

Parsons, Thomas W., 295, 339. 

Partisan, 431. 

Past, 188. 

Pathfinder, 174, 178, 179. 

Patrick Henry, Wirt's Life of, 212. 

Patriot Chief, 148. 

Pattee, F. H., 141. 

Paulding, James Kirke, 163, 368. 

Paul Fane, 358. 

Paul Felton, 201. 

Pavne, John Howard, 194-5. 

Peabody, EUzabeth Palmer, 224. 

Pelayo, 430. 

Pencilings by the Way, 358. 

Penhallow, Samuel, 64. 

"Pennsylvania Farmer," 114. 

Pennsylvania Song, 120. 

Pennsylvania writers, 90-101, 112-6, 
145-53, 155, 209-10, 395-404. 

Pequots, 27, 33. 

Percival, James Gates, 197, 198-9, 
200, 279. 

"Peter Parley," 199, 300, 354, 419. 

"Peter Porcupine," 148-9. 

"Petroleum V. Nasby," 444. 

Peters, Samuel, 155. 

Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart; see Ward,, 
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. 

Philadelphia writers, 90-101, 112-6, 
145-53, 155, 209-10, 395-8, 474. 

Philadelphia as a publishing center, 
461. 

Philip the Second, 341. 

Phillips, Wendell, 51, 265-6. 

Philo, an Evangeliad, 355. 

Philosophic Solitude, 102. 

Philosophy of Composition, 418. 

Piatt, J. J., 439. 

Pickens and Stealings Rebellion, 278. 

Picture of Saint John, 401. 

Picture of New York, 163. 

Pictures from Appledore, 276. 

Pictures of Columbus, 143. 

Pierpont, John, 204. 

Pike, Albert, 435. 

Pike County Ballads, 441. 

Pilgrims, 21, 25, 26, 30, 31; con- 
trasted with Southern writers, 12. 

Pills, Poetical, Political, and Philo- 
sophical, 208. 

Pilot, 176, 179, 182. 

Pinkney, Edward Coate, 212. 

Pioneers, 176, 179, 268. 

Pioneers of France in the New World, 
345. 

Pit and the Pendulum, 423, 424. 

Place of the Independent in Politics, 
278. 



Index 



497 



Plain Language from Truthful James, 
455. 

Plain Talks on Familiar Subjects, 338. 

Plays and Poems, 398. 

Plumb Pudding for Peter Porcupine, 
149-50. 

Plymouth Colony, 21, 25, 30. 

Poe, Edgar Allan, 143, 152, 159, 268, 
317, 340, 353, 357, 362, 374, 376, 
385, 395, 404, 410, 412-28: life and 
character, 414-7, literary criti- 
cism, 417-20, poems, 420-22, prose 
tales, 422-6, genius and rank, 
426-8; 438. 

Poem on the Happiness of America, 
133. 

Poems of Arouet, 139. 

Poems of the Orient, 400, 401. 

Poems of the War, 398. 

Poems on Several Occasions, 100. 

Poems on Slavery, 287. 

Poet at the Breakfast-Table, 322, 323, 
326, 330. 

"Poet of the American Revolution," 
141. 

Poets and Poetry of America, 362. 

Poefs Journal, 400. 

Poets of America, 374, 376, 377. 

Poetic Principle, 418. 

Poetry, a Metrical Essay, 329. 

Poetry and Mystery of Dreams, 397. 

Poetry in New England, 46, 54, 55-6, 
84-8. 

Politian, 420. 

Political Essays, 271. 

Political Greenhouse, 134. 

PoHtical writings, 103-22, 156-7. 

Ponkapog Papers, 380. 

Ponteach, 139. 

"Poor Richard," 84, 95-6, 98. 

Pope, 86, 120, 124, 133, 156, 157, 
184. 

Porcupiniad, 150. 

Pory, John, 10. 

Potiphar Papers, 364. 

Prairie, 177, 179. 

Precaution, 175, 176. 

Prentice, George D., 436-7. 

Prenticeana, 437. 

Prescott, William Kicking, 341-2. 

Present Crisis, 273. 

Present State of Virginia, 19. 

Preston, Margaret Junkin, 412. 

Pretty Story, 146. 

Prince, Thomas, 61-2. 

Prince and the Pauper, 448. 

Prince Deukalion, 401. 

Prince of India, 441. 

Prince of Parthia, 100. 



Printing in New England colonies, 22; 

in Virginia, 13. 
"Private Miles O'Reilly," 385. 
Problem, 236. 
Probus; see Aurelian. 
Professor at the Breakfast-Table, 322, 

325, 326. 
Professor's Story; see Elsie Venner. 
Progress of Dulness, 125. 
Progress to the Mines, 17. 
Prometheus, 268, 273. 
Prose Sketches and Poems, 436. 
Prose Writers of America, 362. 
Prospect of Peace, 131. 
Prophet, 401. 

Proud Miss McBride, 353. 
Prudence Palfrey, 379. 
Prue and I, 363, 364. 
Psalm of Life, 263, 292, 298. 
Pudd'nhead Wilson, 448, 449, 450. 
Puritans, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 28, 30, 

31, 33, 37, 40, 55, 56, 57, 221, 222, 

223, 254; contrasted with Southern 

colonists, 11, 12. 
Purloined Letter, 425, 427. 

Quest of Merlin, 473. 

Rag-Bag, 358. 

Rainbow, 212. 

Rappaccini's Daughter, 310. 

Ralph, James, 100. 

Ramona, 453. 

Ramsey, David, 218. 

Raven, 418, 421, 422, 427. 

Realism, recent tendencies toward, 

463. 
Realf, Richard, 442. 
Read, Thomas Buchanan, 397, 403. 
Recollections, 374. 
Recollections of a Busy Life, 361. 
Recollections of Persons and Places in 

the West, 438. 
Reconciliation, 148. 
Red Badge of Courage, 473. 
Red Rover, 177, 179, 182. 
Redburn, 369. 
Redeemed Captive Returning to Zion, 

59-60. 
Redskins, 179. 
Religious writings in New England, 

36-45. 
"Renaissance" of New England, 223. 
Repplier, Agnes, 474. 
Representative Men, 228, 235. 
Reveries of a Bachelor, 347. 
Revolutionary Period, 103-157. 
Rhode Island writers, 109, 139, 

352-3. 



498 



Index 



Rhodora, 237. 

Rhymed Lesson, 329. 

Richard Edney, 355. 

Richard Hardis, 431. 

Rights of Man, 115. 

Riley, James Whitcomb, 478. 

Rill from the Town Pump, 310. 

Ripley, George, 224, 250-1, 357, 361. 

Rip van Winkle, 166, 167, 168. 

Rise of the Dutch Republic, 343. 

Rising Glory of America, 141. 

Rittenhouse, David, 101. 

River Fight, 351. 

River Path, 261. 

Rob of the Bowl, 211. 

Roba di Roma, 340. 

Rock me to Sleep, Mother, 354. 

Roe, Edward Payson, 370. 

Rogers, Robert, 139. 

"Rollo" books, 354. 

Roman Lawyer in Jerusalem, 340. 

Roman Singer, 471. 

Rose, Aquilla, 99. 

Roosevelt, Theodore, 470. 

Roughing It, 448. 

Rowen, 468. 

Rowlandson, Mary, 59. 

Rowson, Susanna Haswell, 136. 

Roxy, 440. 

Rudder Grange, 469. 

Rulers of the South, 472. 

Ruling Passion, 138. 

Rush, Benjamin, 218-9. 

Ryan, Abram J., 412. 

Sack of Rome, 136. 

Salmagundi, 161, 163, 164, 165, 191, 

192. 
Salve Venetia, 472. 
Sands, R. C, 187, 195, 196. 
Sandys, George, 9-10. 
Sant' Ilario, 471. 
Saracinesca, 471. 
Sargent, Epes, 340. 
Sargent, Lucius M., 204. 
Satanstoe, 179. 
"Saxe Holme," 453. 
Saxe, John G., 353. 
Scarlet Letter, 303, 304, 311-4, 316, 

317. 
Scholarship, 153, 216-9. 
Schoolcraft, Henry Rowe, 218, 294, 

372. 
Science of English Verse, 407, 408. 
Scientists, 218-9. 
Scout; see Kinsman. 
Scudder, Horace E., 336, 337. 
Sea Dream, 261. 
Seabury, Samuel, 110, 111, 114. 



Sea-Lions, 179. 

Seaside and the Fireside^ 288. 

Seccomb, John, 86. 

Sectionalism in American literature, 
159. 

Sedgwick, Catherine M., 196, 206, 
3X)4. 

Seein' Things at Night, 482. 

Selections from the Poetical Literature 
of the West, 437. 

Selling of Joseph, 65. 

Septimius Felton, 309. 

Sermons in early New England, 37, 
38-9. 

Sewall, Jonathan, 109, 139. 

Sewall, Samuel, 56, 65-6, 89, 92. 

Shadow, 425. 

Shakespeare, 1, 8, 23, 24, 196, 279, 
366; possibly indebted to Strachey, 
8, 9. 

Sharps and Flats, 480, 481, 482. 

Shaw, Henry W., 443, 444. 

Shaw, John, 212. 

She Came and Went, 273. 

Shepard, Thomas, 39, 40-1, 81, 85. 

Sheridan's Ride, 404. 

Shillaber, Benjamin P., 356. 

Short Sixes, 468. 

Short story, recent development of, 
463. 

Sigourney, Lydia Huntley, 197-8. 

Silence 42^ 

Sill, Edward Rowland, 458-60. 

Silliman, Benjamin, 219. 

Silverwood, 412. 

Simms, 404, 428-32: life, 428-30, 
poems, 430, prose fiction, 430-1, 
miscellaneous work, 431-2, rank, 
432. 

Simple Cobler of Aggawamm, 43-5, 
46. 

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry 
God, 79. 

Sirens, 272. 

Sisters, 261. 

Skeleton in Armor, 292. 

Sketch Book, 165-6, 167, 168, 169, 
170, 174, 192, 285, 286. 

Skipper Ireson's Ride, 261, 264. 

Sleeper, 421, 422. 

Smith, F. Hopkinson, 464, 470. 

Smith, John, 2-8: life and adven- 
tures, 3-4, writings, 4-5, his ve- 
racity, 6, literary qualities, 6-8; 10, 
11, 20. 

Smith, Samuel F., 334. 

Smith, Seba, 356. 

South Carolina writers, 428-34. 

Snow Ima^ge, 310. 



Index 



499 



Snow Image and other Twice-Told 

Tales, 304, 310. 
Snow-Bound, 259, 261. 
Society and Solitude, 228. 
Society upon the Stanislaus, 458. 
Songs and Sonnets, 380. 
Songs from Vagabondia, 473. 
Songs of a Semite, 384. 
Songs of Childhood, 481. 
Songs of the Revolution, 120-1. 
Sonnets and Canzonets, 244. 
Sot-Weed Factor, 15-6. 
Sotweed Redivivus, 16-7. 
South Carolina writers, 20, 428-34. 
Southern characteristics affecting ht- 

Southern 'writers, 116-9, 211-3, 404- 

36, 474-7. 
Spagnoletto, 384. 
Spanish Papers, 172. 
Spanish Student, 293. 
Sparks, Jared, 200, 217. 
Specimen Days, 387, 389. 
Spectator, 91, 95, 125. 
Sphinx, 236. 
Spirit-Rapper (The), an Autohiog- 

raphy, 253. 
Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes, 38. 
Spofford, Harriet Prescott, 331, 466. 
Sprague, Charles, 204. 
Spy, 173, 175, 176, 179, 182, 431. 
Stansbury, Joseph, 121-2. 
Stars of the Summer Night, 293. 
Star-Spangled Banner, 212. 
Stedman, Edmund Clarence, 357, 

373, 375-8: life and literary labors, 

375-6, as editor and critic, 376-7, 

as poet, 377-8; 381, 382. 
Stiles, Ezra, 156. 
Stillwater Tragedy, 379. 
Stith, WiUiam, 19-20. 
Stockton, Frank R., 469. 
Stoddard, Richard Henry, 373-5, 378, 

381, 382, 402. 
Stone, Reverend Mr., 47. 
Stories of New Jersey, 470. 
Story, Joseph, 200, 203. 
Story, WilHam Wetmore, 266, 268, 

280, 339-40. 
Story of a Bad Boy, 378, 379, 380, 381. 
Story of a New York House, 468. 
Story of Kennett, 402. 
Story of the Whistle, 97. 
Story or two from a Dutch Town, 335. 
Stout Gentleman, 168. 
Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 269, 348-51, 

366. 
Strachey, William, 8-9, 10. 
Street, Alfred B., 386. 



Street Lyrics, 398. 

Summary, Historical and Politii^al, of 
the First Planting, Progressive Im- 
provements and Present State of the 
British Settlements in North Amer- 
ica, 64. 

Summary View of the Rights of British 
America, 118. 

Summer on the Lakes, 247. 

Sumner, Charles, 287, 346. 

Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands, 
350. 

Sunrise, 409. 

Sunset on the Bear camp, 261. 

Swallow Barn, 211. 

Sword and the Distaff, 431. 

Sword of Bunker Hill, 385. 

Sword of Lee, 412. 

Sylphs of the Seasons, 202. 

Symphony, 409. 

Symposium, 224, 243. 

Tabb, John B., 475. 

Table Talk, 244. 

Tablets, 244. 

Tailfer, Patrick, 20. 

Tales of a Traveller, 167, 168. 

Tales of a Wayside Inn, 288, 295, 296, 
297. 

Tales of Glauber Spa, 196, 206. 

Tales of the Argonauts and other 
Sketches, 455. 

Tales of the Border, 214. 

Taliesin, 473. 

Talisman, 187, 195, 196. 

Tamerlane, 420. 

Tamerlane and other Poems, 414. 

Tanglewood Tales, 304, 311. 

Tannhauser, 384. 

Taylor, Bayard, 259, 373, 378, 381, 
382, 397, 398-403: life, 398-400, 
poetry, 400-1, dramatic works, 
401-2, novels, 402, other prose, 
402-3, rank, 403. 

Telling the Bees, 261. 

T ell-Tale Heart, 424. 

Ten Great Religions, 254. 

Tent on the Beach, 259, 260, 261. 

Tenth Muse, 49. 

Terrible Tractoration, 207. 

Thanatopsis, 185, 188, 190. 

Thaxter, Celia L., 354. 

Theology Explained and Defended, 129. 

Thomas, Isaiah, 217. 

Thomas, Edith, 478. 

Thompson, Benjamin, Count Rum- 
ford, 219. 

Thompson, Daniel P., 353. 

Thompson, Maurice, 479. 



600 



Index 



Thoreau, Henry David, 224, 238-42: 
life, 238, personality, 239-40, prose, 
240-1, verse, 241, rank, 242; 252, 
279, 302. 

*^Thou art minej thou hast given thy 
word,'' 378. 

Thoughts on the poets, 368. 

Threading my Way, 438. 

Threnody, 236. 

Ticknor, Frank O., 435. 

Ticknor, George, 200, 203, 286, 290. 

Ti{ier Lilies, 406, 408. 

Timothy Titcomb's Letters, 338. 

Timrod, Henry, 404, 429, 432-3, 434. 

To a Mosquito, 188. 

To a Pine-Tree, 273. 

To a Waterfowl, 185, 190. 

To Heleri, 421, 422. 

To One in Paradise, 422. 

To Science, 420. 

To Seneca Lake, 199. 

To the Dandelion, 273. 

To the Fringed Gentian, 188. 

Toinette, 434. 

Token, 199, 300. 

Tortessa; or the Usurer Matched, 358. 

Tom Sawyer, 379, 444, 447, 448, 449, 
450. 

Tom Thornton, 201. 

Tour on the Prairies, 171, 172. 

Tourgee, Albert W., 434. 

Toujours Amour, 378. 

Townsend, Mary Ashley, 436. 

Tramp Abroad, 448. 

Transcendental Club, 224. 

Transcendentalism, 161, 173. 

Transcendentalists, 222-254, 361. 

Transformation; see Marble Faun, 

Treatise on the Freedom of the Will, 79. 

Tribune, New York, 245, 250, 251, 252. 

Tribune Primer, 480. 

Trowbridge, J. T., 269, 331, 333, 336, 
466. 

True Relation of Virginia, 4, 6, 7. 

True Reportory of the Wracke and Re- 
demption of Sir Thomas Gates, 8, 9. 

True Travels, Adventures, and Obser- 
vations of Captain John Smith, 5. 

Trumps, 363, 364. 

Trumbull, John, 123, 124-6, 129, 132, 
133, 134. 

Tuckerman, Henry T., 368. 

Tudor, William, 200. 

Twain, Mark, 181, 337, 379, 444-52: 
life, 444-6, influenced by West, 
446, personality, 447, writings, 447- 
52, humor, 448, rank, 452. 

Twice-Told Tales, 300, 310, 418. 

Two Admirals, 179. 



Two Men of Sandy Bar, 455, 457. 
Two Years Before the Mast, 332, 369. 
Tyler, Royall, 138-9. 
Typee, 369. 

Ulalume, 421, 422. 

Ultima Thule, 289. 

"Uncle Remus" tales, 476. 

Uncle Tom's Cabin, 349, 350, 435. 

Under the Evening Lamp, 374. 

Under the Violets, 330. 

Under the Willows, 270, 276. 

Underbrush, 332. 

Unhappy Lot of Mr, Knott, 276. 

United Netherlands, 343. 

Universal History on the Basis of 

Geography, 300. 
University of Pennsylvania, 99. 

Vagabonds, 333. 

Valerian, 210. 

Van Dyke, Henry, 470. 

Vassal Morton, 344. 

Venus of Milo, 459. 

Vermont writers, 138, 353. 

Verplanck, GuHan C, 187, 195-6. 

Verse in New England colonies, 

46-54, 84-8. 
Very, Jones, 224, 251, 252, 268. 
Victorian Anthology, 376. 
Victorian Poets, 376. 
Views Afoot, 399. 
Vindication of the Conduct of the House 

of Representatives, 105. 
Vindication of the Government of New 

England Churches, 82. 
Virginia Comedians, 411. 
Virginia writers, 1-20, 116-9, 211, 

410-28; contrasted with those of 

Massachusetts, 23. 
Vision of Columbus, 131, 132. 
Vision of Sir Launfal, 268, 272, 276, 

281, 329. 
Voiceless, 330. 

Voices of the Night, 286, 287, 292. 
Voyage to Virginia, 18. 
Voyages of Columbus, 169. 
Voyages of the Companions of Colum- 
bus, 169. 

Wagoner of the Alleghanies, 404. 

Wakendah, 372. 

Walden, or Life in the Woods, 238, 

240-1. 
Wallace, Lew, 440-1, 478. 
Wallace, William R., 385. 
Wandering Recollections of a Some^ 

what Busy Life, 208. 
Wanted — A Man, 377. 



Index 



501 



War is Kind, 474. 

War Poetry of the South, 432. 

Ward, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, 331, 
335, 466. 

Ward, Nathaniel, 43-5, 46. 

Ware, WiUiam, 335, 337. 

Warner, Charles Dudley, 336, 337, 
448. 

Warren, Mercy Otis, 135-6, 153. 

Warren's Address, 204. 

Water-Witch, 177. 

Way to Wealth, 95-6. 

Ways of the Hour, 179. 

Wayside, 304. 

Webster, Daniel, 215-6, 346. 

Webster, Noah, 155, 219; his dic- 
tionary, 198. 

Week on the Concord and Merrimac 
Rivers, 238, 240. 

Weems, Mason L., 216-7. 

Welby, Ameha B., 438. 

Welde, Thomas, 48. 

Wept of Wish-ton-Wish, 177. 

West Wind, 190. 

"Westchester Farmer," 110, 111. 

Western Clearings, 371. 

Western Souvenir, 214. 

Western writers, 213-4, 477-83, 436^ 
60. 

Westovev Manuscripts, 17. 

Westward Ho, 192. 

Wet Days at Edgewood, 347, 348. 

Wharton, Edith, 470. 

What I know of Farming, 361. 

What Was It? a Mystery, 371. 

Wheatley, PhilHs, 136. 

When Lilacs Last in the Door-Yard 
Bloom'd, 394. 

Whitaker, Alexander, 10. 

Whitcher, Frances M., 372. 

White, Maria, 267, 271. 

White, Richard Grant, 366. 

Whitefield, George, 20, 68, 78. 

White-Jacket, 369. 

Whitman, Sarah Helen, 352-3. 

Whitman, Walt, 372, 373, 384, 386- 
95: hfe and writings, 386-8, char- 
acter, 388-9, motive in writing, 390, 
verse form, 390-1, views on life and 
Uterature, 392-4, rank, 394; 403, 
464, 473, 474. 

Whittier, James Greenleaf, 145, 256- 
65: early life, 256-7, early writings, 
258, antislavery labors, 257-8, per- 
sonal life, 258-9, poems, 259-62, 
prose, 262-3, literary characteris- 
tics, 263-5; 269, 284, 377, 382, 383, 
384, 433, 437. 

Whipple, Edwin Percy, 334, 374. 



Widow Bedott Papers, 372. 
Widow of Malabar, 133. 
Wieland, 151, 152, 153. 
Wigglesworth, Michael, 51-4, 56, 84, 

199. 
Wild Honeysuckle, 144. 
Wilde, Richard Henry, 212-3. 
Wilderness and the War-Path, 214. 
Wilkins, Mary E. ; see Freeman, Mary 

E. Wilkins. 
Willard, Samuel, 82. 
William and Mary College, 13, 19, 

20. 
WiUiams, Roger, 38, 41-3. 
Wmiams, John, 59-60, 84. 
WilHs, Nathaniel Parker, 150, 357- 

60, 363, 378, 414. 
Wilson, Alexander, 219. 
Wind-Clouds and Star-Drifts, 330. 
Wing-and-Wing, 179. 
Winslow, Edward, 25-6. 
Winter, William, 371, 373, 379, 470. 
Winthrop, John, 28, 30, 62, 341, 

352. 
Winthrop, Theodore, 352. 
Wirt, WilUam, 117, 211. 
Wise, John, 81. 
Wister, Owen, 464, 474. 
Witchcraft, 71. 
Witherspoon, John, 156. 
WolferVs Roost, 172. 
Woman in colonial New England, 

55-6. 
Woman in the Nineteenth Century^ 

248. 
Wonder Book, 304, 311. 
Wondersmith, 371. 
Wonders of the Invisible World, 75. 
Wonder-Working Providence of Sion's 

Saviour in New England, 33-4. 
Wood, WilUam, 35, 46. 
Woodberry, George E., 376, 470. 
Woodcraft; see Sword and Distaff, 
Woodman, Spare that Tree^ 195. 
Woodnotes, 236. 
Woodworth, Samuel, 195. 
Wooing of Malkatoon, 441. 
Woolman, John, 145. 
Woolson, Constance Fenimore, 467. 
Worcester, Joseph E., 219. 
Wound-Dresser, 388, 389. 
Wracke and Redemption of Sir Thomas 

Gates, 8, 9. 
Wreck of the Hesperus, 292. 
Wyandotte, 179. 
Wyndham Towers, 380. 
Wynken^ Blynken, and Nod, 482, 

"Xariffa," 436. 



502 Index 

Yale College, 77, 123. Yesterdays with Authors, 331. 

Yamoyden, 196. Youth of Jefferson, 411. 

Yankee Doodle, 120. 

Yankee Gypsies, 262. Zadoc Pine and other Stories, 468. 

Yankee in Canada, 240. Zenobia, or the Fall of Palmyra, 

Year's Life, 267, 273. 335. 

Ytmassee, 428, 431. Zophiel, or The Bride of Seven, 206. 



AUG 16 19U 



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LbMr'30 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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011 813 244 



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